Fellow Veterans
by dmanderson
Summary: Three years after the Battle of Hogwarts, Dumbledore's Army is having a good time at a pub while attracting the attention of a fellow veteran who is profoundly perplexed at where these young warriors got their scars and thousand yard stares
1. Chapter 1 Muggles seeing the elephant

_**STANDARD DISCLAIMER: I own nothing in this universe that I am playing with. All canon characters are JK Rowling and the world is hers.**_

 _ **I am attempting to keep this canon-compliant although I will be writing about adult and/or explicit themes.**_

 _ **Enjoy!**_

 **May 1, 2001 Muggle London**

"Look over there, back wall… what do you see"

"Kids, out for a drink and a snog. Well, that tall redhead is going to get laid tonight… but I see kids"

The two men drinking a pint of ale in a dark corner of the Copper Cauldron had their heads together and were whispering quietly. They had known each other for their entire adult lives. From afar, neither man was particularly notable. Both were in their late 40s or early 50s. They were fit but not amazingly so; it was not a fitness of the gym and low carb Mediterranean diets, but the fitness of daily doing. Their hair was short and well trimmed but it was not a banker's haircut or a crew cut of young men who had better things to do with their time than caring about their hair. The clothes were rightly forgettable. Comfortable slacks and a sweater on the taller man who had spoken first, while trousers and a button down covered by a cardigan were worn by the second man.

They were forgettable men. Or at least they were forgettable until one looked at their eyes and then they became completely unforgettable. Their eyes were alert and always moving. Relaxation could be seen in their bodies but not in their eyes. The taller man's green eyes scanned the room like he was an early warning radar looking for Russian bombers even as the average sized man's blue eyes inventoried everyone about as if he was a conman looking for his next mark.

"Look again, look hard…."

The short man looked again, and he looked hard. His eyes and his head never focused on the youngsters eleven meters away, but he never stopped noticing.

Across the room, about twenty young adults were raising their drinks and eating from a buffet table. None of them were over the age of twenty-five. Almost half of them were women and all of them were at least decent looking if not stunning. An ethereal blonde was in some ways the most attractive although the red head whose arm was on the shoulder of an average looking young man with brown hair and NHS glasses would have the most experience in causing a room of young men to shut up and pant.

Their clothes were well made. Most were dressed as either university students or junior assistant bankers. But on half of them, the well fitted sweaters and jackets and dresses were worn like costumes. This was not their regular mode of dress and presentation. This was public facing wear. The blonde had earrings that even from here looked off, round orange globes with green leaf work. A necklace on the brunette changed colors every few seconds; the light in the pub was not that variable and she did not strike him as one who would wear a childish mood ring for jewelry.

Far more importantly than the clothing or their jewelry were their eyes. Several of the party goers were continually scanning the room. They had taken one of the few places in the restaurant where eyes could be on the front door, the side door and the kitchen door. The probing eyes never stared at anyone, instead they catalogued the scene and a few seconds later, they only saw the differences. Sometimes they were laughing at a joke, or reaching for a glass, but their eyes never stopped. All of them were doing this without thinking.

Outside of the pub, a large bang was heard. The short man paused for a second as he catalogued the sound - not a bomb, and not a gunshot. An infinitesimal moment later, he classified the noise as a large truck backfiring. He relaxed. And as he was relaxing, he saw the youths across the room relax as well. Half of them had hands in their jackets or purses while at least three of them including the redhead who was destined to get laid had spread out and advanced towards the door.

"Ahh… I know what's bothering Sergeant Major Houlihan… they are veterans and you don't know who the hell they are…."

"Exactly Colonel, if you walk by them, their accents are all over Britain; the short guy closest to us has to be from Derry, while the two redheads are brother and sister from the south. The average looking guy in the middle is Surrey while the brunette spent too much time learning the Queen's English as a middle class striver from the Home Counties… We should know them. The Regiment is the only British unit that has seen significant combat time since those kids hit puberty. I've seen them in this pub last year on the 1st of May and a small group of them are almost regulars here. I should know them. "

The two men who had the scars to prove their friendship and loyalty to each other sipped their beers. They kept an eye on the crowds that were coming into the pub for an evening drink and then leaving. The mystery deepened as they observed more. The group was actually two different groups across the room. One group was clearly single combat warriors or commandos; their discipline was not deferential and they lived and breathed as a small trio. The participants in that trio were remarkably average; spectacled raven haired man, the lithe young woman with the flashy necklace and the tall redhead. The Sergeant Major had shared the same bond with the other four men who had spent weeks in a tiny hole near a major river crossing in the winter of 1991. The long wavy haired young woman and the tall redhead were an obvious couple but everyone around the group liked him, and respected if not slightly feared her. The others were soldiers, used to being under discipline and under command. The busty redhead or the thick set, heavily muscled man with a widow's peak were the obvious commanders although they deferred and consulted frequently with the blonde.

They had seen these breakdowns whenever the Regiment had a barbecue. The little cliques of experience from Goose Green to Basra and

the dozens of places that no one could officially discuss formed within a drink or two. It was natural that the people who one trusted one's life to and who trusted their life to you were the ones that you wanted to be around.

Another ale was ordered. The women were driving the sergeant major and the colonel nuts; the women at Regimental family events were peripheral. The children were extraneous. Usually everyone had a bite to eat and a drink before the men found their comrades in arms and the women clustered together and talked about the inanities of day to day life of being married into the regiment. The wives and girlfriends were used to their men disappearing for weeks if not months. They were used to seeing new scars on their men and then being told first not to ask and then not to worry. The sergeant major had a dozen scars from half a dozen bad days on his body, and his wife of twenty three years could guess without asking where most of them came from.

Here the women were just as involved in the conversations. Here the women had scars. A tall Desi girl had what looked like a gauntlet scar running from her chin to inches above her bicep. The brunette was obviously tortured with a very sharp knife. It took a while and a trip to the water closet for the colonel to see the details of the job that would have scared any surgeon in charge of reconstruction. At least four of the men had visible scars, the implicit leader had a collection of scars on his face, his arms and his hands that could rival that of most men in the Regiment. He was not surprised by the men bearing scars, but the women puzzled him.

"Just who are they Sergeant?"

"I don't know Colonel, but I think we should find out."


	2. Chapter 2 To the Living

Tonight was a night to celebrate the living.

The third Remembrance Day was tomorrow. Everyone who had fought at the Battle of Hogwarts and survived would be there. There would be speeches,there would be toasts, there would be tours of the reconstructed school. The Minister would be in charge and the senior witches and wizards of the Ministry had arranged everything. The reception afterwards would be a good chance for all of the survivors to see each other, both the fighters who had fought back the Death Eaters from the walls in the first part of the battle and the families and villagers of Hogsmeade who had delivered the fatal counter-attack.

Tonight was for a far smaller crowd. Dumbledore's Army was assembled. The signal had gone out via enchanted Galleon weeks ago. Full buffet and an open bar on Harry's tab at their regular Muggle pub.

Not everyone could make it; Lee Jordan was in South America, Dennis Creavy had finals for his Muggle university today. He had promised to make it up to Hogwarts first thing in the morning. Cho had faded away from the group. She had stood on the stage to receive her Order of Merlin 3rd Class in October, 1998 but she had never felt truly part of Dumbledore's Army after Hermione's curse in 1996 disfigured one of her best friends. That and her history with Harry had made things awkward afterwards. Two more had to excuse themselves; Angelina and George were at St. Mungo's as her water broke earlier that afternoon.

Discreet Muffliato charms had been cast and a few soft Muggle repellent wards were placed. Harry did not want anyone to be disturbed which is why they were here instead of at the Leaky Cauldron. Three Broomsticks had been taken over by the first generation of the Order of the Phoenix for their lodgings and gatherings, while Alberforth's pub, the Hog's Head was where the Ministry had camped out. All of them were staked out by the press and well wishers. The owner of the Copper Cauldron had been more than happy to rent out part of her pub on a slow Thursday night to a group of regulars that were always polite to the waitresses and willing to pay cash for a full buffet and an open bar.

Harry stood on a chair and felt Ginny squeeze his hand. He hated to speak in public. He had gotten better at it since that day in the Hog's Head that led them all to this night, but he would rather face a Dementor than a crowd. The waitress, a friendly Muggle had passed out shots of decent but not amazing decade old Scotch to the entire crowd and then stepped out just before Harry spoke.

"Welcome friends, Ginny and I just want to make sure that everyone has a good time tonight. We have a long weekend in front of us. Let's eat, drink and be merry for tomorrow we're on our best behavior. Tonight is a time to celebrate our living as tomorrow we remember those who have passed beyond the veil. Our house is always open to those who fought with us against vile evil.

To the living"

Every present member of Dumbledore's Army raised their glass and then their voices:

"To the living"

And then they slammed the shot. The party had started.

Hermione's face looked like she had been bat bogey hexed.

"Harry, that stuff is foul… I don't understand why my dad likes it so much"

"That was not what your father likes." Ron smiled. He had scored himself serious future father in law points when he brought a bottle of Johnny Walker Black to the Granger house for Christmas. He still preferred barrel aged fire whiskey but saw the attraction of a long barrelled Muggle whiskey blend. It was one of the safer areas of conversation he could have with Mr. Granger as Ron was slowly willing to explore Scotch and Irish whiskeys with a budding connessueir. Football was still confusing to Ron. Quidditch could not be discussed in public although the Grangers had become Chudley Cannon season ticket holders for the upcoming season.

He went to the bar and came back a minute later with four small glasses. A single ice cube was slowly melting in each glass.

"Here, Mi, try this…" Ron handed his fiancee a glass of thirty year Scotch. He then handed the other two to his sister and his best friend.

"Take your time, take in the flavor head, take in the entire aroma complex, and drink it like a fine wine tasting."

Hermione took her time and closed her eyes as the complex interplay of grains and tannins tingled her nose. She could feel the peat bogs that fed the flames that heated the mash, and soon she could see the salt water marshes that encircled the distillery. The first sip had fire and then a soothing warmth spread in her mouth.

"You're right, that is different Ron." She smiled and gave her lover and her friend and her companion and her comrade in arms a kiss that promised oh so much more tonight once they got back to Grimwauld Place. Thankfully Harry and Ginny had placed strong sound suppressing wards on the spare bedroom that Ron and Hermione frequently borrowed after a night in Muggle London.

Across the room, Hannah Abbott laughed as Neville told their friends about the rare South American orchid he had given to Hannah for Christmas. It was gorgeous, but it made her sneeze. Now the orchid was occupying the Hogwart's greenhouse while Neville and Professor Sprout tested it for any magical properties besides beauty. She had barely put down her empty glass when the waitress (that is the word Muggles used instead of barmaid) came by and asked if she wanted another. Hannah was not on the schedule tonight at the Three Broomsticks so the decision was easy. Another one for her please.

She looked around. The Muggle pub was little different than the Magic pubs; the lights were electrical instead of candles or blue bells of flames, and the floors were not wooden. But this was a pub. Off in the right hand corner were a trio of young drunks who were learning how to become old drunks from a regular. Next to them, a cluster of pretty girls were talking with each other and trying to avoid attention. A pair of old friends about the age of most of the parents of Dumbledore's Army were having a pint. Next to them were a couple with a baby in a pram having a drink before heading back while a few boys were working on convincing the shyest one amongst them to get up the courage to talk to a trio of girls two tables over. The only big difference was the ordering and payment systems. Muggle money still confused her. She could do it, one hundred pennies to the pound and floating exchanges of euros to pounds but she had to think instead of just pulling out the knuts and sickles to make change from a galleon. The waitresses had short books and then they hovered over computers that sent an order into the back of the house. They did not have house elves but the kitchen was as efficient as any as she had ever seen.

Her eyes went over the room and they lingered on the two older men. They were looking at her. They weren't staring at her chest. That was a point in their favor, but they were looking with intent. Was it intent to start a fight? They were too old, although the suppleness of their movement hinted that they had strength and speed that one would not expect. Was it an intent to overhear the likely to be drunken words of the famed members of Dumbledore's Army? Were they reporters on speculation with the _Daily Prophet?_

She pulled Neville close to her and whispered in his ear:

"Honey, take a look without being obvious at those two men on the back wall over your left shoulder… they're watching us."

Neville gave his girlfriend a brief kiss on the cheek and then picked her up. He was so much stronger today than anyone could have imagined on the first ride on the Hogwart's Express. His was a strength of digging and planting and lugging and weeding. Hannah's weight quickly left the ground and was fully supported in his large, square, slightly dirty hands. He moved his head slightly to kiss her. As she closed his eyes, he spun her around and took in the entire room as he kept his eyes open. Three seconds was enough time for him to see what his friend, lover and future saw. And then he closed his eyes and lost himself in her.

They could have snogged forever or at least a while long. However Ron decided to engage in a loud critique of their technique. Both Hannah and Neville responded with a single finger as they broke off their kiss. Flush from excitement, they giggled even as Ginny moved over to separate her brother from civilized society.

"I'm sorry, he'll never be more than 14. I pity Hermione. She should be frustrated by now"

"Hey, we're among friends now… but Gin, those two men on the back wall, they're watching us. And doing a really good job of not making it obvious."

Ginny took half a glance. The two men were hunched over their beer and laughing about something. Hands were moving in explanation of an unknowable story. Their chairs were tilted so that only the corner of their eyes were able to dart to the gathering of witches and wizards. It was the same casual indifference to the observation target that she and Neville had trained dozens of resistors on in the castle in that horrendous year. They were good. She reached into the green dragon skinned bag that she used as her Muggle purse and barely touched her wand. A blink of an eye and a wordless spell washed over the bar. No other magical beings were nearby.

"They are Muggles. Pass the word to keep an eye on them without staring at them. I'll go left and play host, while you guys go right. Ask Luna to take a hard look at them. Don't bother Harry, he's stressed out enough right now being the Boy Who Lived, let him relax."

Ginny gave her friends a hug before heading left to the next cluster of veterans and friends. As she was starting to talk with Katie, Parvati and Padma, a loud bang was heard. She reached into her bag and her fingers were closing around her wand. The noise sounded like someone bouncing off of the anti-Apparation charms that she had placed around the pub that afternoon. She, Katie and both of the Patil twins were silently casting Protego charms even as Ron, Terry and Ernie knocked her into a table as they ran by to take positions by the front door.

Half a second after the noise faded, Hermione called out it was merely a truck backfiring and that everyone could relax. Ginny had not realized how tense she was until she heard Hermione's order to relax. Another beer would help.


	3. Chapter 3 To feeling alive

**Chapter 3**

 **May 2, 2001**

 **12 Grimmauld Place**

His head hurt. Hagrid had to have placed a baby dragon, a hippogriff and a glittery rubber ball in his skull. The baby dragon was a far better football player than the hippogriff as the ball was continually going into the net that was placed just behind his left ear. He shook his head.

Ginny barely stirred. Her arm was across his chest, and her face was buried in the pillow avoiding the light streaming through the floor to ceiling windows. He could see her naked body outlined underneath the cotton sheet. Kreacher had evidently decided to earn a punishment by opening up the curtains and flooding the room with brilliantly sunlight. He should have known better after last year that this morning was a morning for darkness, quiet and greasy breakfasts for his master.

Harry tried to wordless cast ACCIO Hangover Potion but the words could not form right in his brain. Instead, he gently disentangled himself from Ginny and walked across the master suite and pulled the stopper off the small orange vial. The potion was foul, smelling of rotten eggs, gym socks left in his Quidditch bag for a week and a hint of fermented oat mash. He tipped his head, and before the first drops passed his lips, he felt his eyes roll.

"I don't want to. Don't make me….don't like, want to stop…" Professor Dumbledore's face was contorted worse than if he had been Crucio-ed by Bellatrix or even Voldemort. His eyes were full of tears as the worst memories of his life and his greatest mistakes. His pitiful whimpering faded out as the last drops of the potion went down Harry's throat. Even as his stomach calmed, he tipped over, his hands on his knees.

His scar was calm. It had not bothered him for three years now. But that was all that was calm. Dumbledore had not popped into his head in months. Usually, a battle or a skirmish from school could fill his mind when he least expected it. Occulumancy could keep out other thoughts from his head, but he could not protect himself from his own thoughts.

As he was catching his breath, he could feel Ginny's arms reach around him. Her nakedness warmed him and in any other circumstance, he would have been a healthy twenty year old man with his beautifully nude girlfriend. Instead he just allowed himself to collapse onto the cold wooden floor.

"Harry, you're safe. I'm here. You're safe" Ginny's voice was quiet and calm. Anyone looking at the two could see the tenderness. Anyone listening would have thought Muffliato had been cast. She was helping Harry this morning. He had held her many nights in the past when the nightmares of her sixth year shook her. His head was in her lap. Her fingers stroked his hair as she kept up her mantra:

"You're safe. I'm here. You're safe."

He stayed with Ginny until he could feel his feet respond to his commands.

He stayed with Ginny until he could feel his stomach unclench.

He stayed with Ginny until Professor Dumbledore's voice could not be heard.

He rose and hugged his girlfriend and then kissed her on her forehead. It was not the start of a bout of frantic lovemaking but it was the intimacy beyond that of most lovers shared in that simple kiss.

"Thanks Gin…"

She smiled. The smile did not hide the pain well. This was the third time this week that Harry had a few drinks, not too many but enough to make him snore and sour his stomach, and woke up seeing Dumbledore or Cedric or Severus in his mind. He had gone weeks without those memories assaulting him, but this week was a hard week. She had her dreams as well. The first time that she was tortured by Alecto had whipped around in her skull on Tuesday night. Harry ended up holding her for hours. He refused to sleep while she was still awake. They trundled into their jobs barely functional on Wednesday. Wednesday was worse as Harry saw Cedric and she saw the night that half of Slytherin ran a train on a 5th Year Hufflepuff Muggle-born witch. She and Neville were forced to watch and any noise that they made resulted in Crucios and engorgement charms. That young girl was one of the first students the DA evacuated. Neither of them could help each other. Tonight she was lucky, a few pleasant dreams about Quidditch and the thought of being Aunt Ginny. She could help tonight.

They sat on their king sized bed, shoulder to shoulder, elbow to elbow, hip to hip, knee to knee. Silence was comfortable between them.

"Let's see the mischief that the rest of the Army has caused since we got home…."

"Coffee and eggs first hun…"

As they stepped out of the master suite, chaos was evident. Kreacher would be appalled. The night before Remembrance Day had become a free for all for Dumbledore's Army. Katie and Padma were walking around topless, hand in hand. Dean Thomas was slowly pistoning Luna as she was moaning and directing him to slow down and allow her to ride the dragon. This morning was tame. Last year, the orgy was ongoing until an hour before the entire Army needed to be at the Ministry for the Portkey. The lovers and significant others who were not in the Army were learning not to ask questions about what happened at Grimmwauld Place on the night before Remembrance Day. The participants signed a magical contract that Hermione had more gently cursed than the original DA contract that bound them to silence.

Harry dodged Parvati and Neville racing on brooms in the hall. They at least had pajamas on. Hermione and Ron were in the kitchen. Oatmeal and eggs were in front of them. Ron had already finished a first plate.

Harry looked at the white streak in Hermione's hair and asked the obvious question.

"Did Kreacher bring down frosted cinnamon rolls, they are delicious." Her face turned the same color as Ron's hair while Ginny laughed.

"Morning mate, morning Gin…. you sleep well?" Ron was trying to be considerate. It was a wasted effort with three spoonfuls of oats in his mouth.

"No worse than normal"

"Dreams again Harry?" Hermione was concerned. She bit her lip as she still had her dreams. Second year petrification competed with Bellatrix for pride of place. She hid her scars as well as she could from her parents; they saw Mudblood on her wrist and knew that it was a war wound, but she did not want them to worry. They had wanted her to talk to a therapist but what could they do; Muggles were outside the Statue of Secrecy and who would believe her anyways.

"Professor Dumbledore drinking Riddle's poison… I just had a few too many drinks last night…"

Ginny and Hermione did their best to hide the disbelieving glance that they shared. Harry's hangover and Ron's ravishment provided cover. One of the most important men in both of their lives was still not right after three years. Ginny remembered that Harry had more dreams and worse nights whenever there was an event. This year was, so far, slightly better than last year which was far better than the first year.

Kreacher apparated next to the four young adults.

"Master Potter and friends, your clothes are set on your beds. Kreacher appreciates the opportunity to clean and purify the house this afternoon." The house elf topped off the coffee and put a plate of pastries on the table. He had become more welcoming to the chaos that the Army had produced each year. Harry and Ginny asked very little of him most of the year. They did not entertain more than Ron and Hermione or the Weasley family gatherings. They seldom had guests of high import over. This was the one time that his skills and magics could be flexed. It was still a downgrade, cleaning up a teenage orgy, from the days when the Black Family could invite the entire Wizamgamot and have at least two thirds attend a soiree, but his masters were young and he could train them.

By mid-afternoon everyone had dressed. Most had showered and the remainder has Scourgified themselves. Dress robes were the uniform of the day. Harry whistled appreciatively as Ginny modeled her risque robes that he had bought for her for Valentine's Day. They were long and heavy enough to qualify as useless for day to day wear, but the V-cut and laced appartures left very little to his imagination.

Lavender was helping Luna adjust her robes. Luna never was able to get her medals lined up. Her Order of Merlin 2nd Class should have been flanked by a commendation medal on the left and her NEWT qualifications on the right. The bars should be aligned at the top while the heavy gold and platinum globe with a sword cutting through it should have hung just over her heart. Nothing was lined up right. Many thought that Luna's sense of direction had to be jinxed as anything she wore would always be slightly off of alignment. Lavender tried anyways.

Neville's bass boomed. "Floo in five minutes, Portkey in twenty"

Shoes were pulled tight. Wands were holstered. Sneakerscopes and Foe Glasses slid into pockets and mokeskin bags. Hermione held her infinitely extended clutch underneath her arm. It contained a full field infirmary, half a dozen brooms and a wall of the most useful objects from Weasleys Wizarding Wheezes. She never went anywhere without her bug out bag.

"Army advance"

Harry held Ginny's hand and they each took a pinch of Floo powder.

"Auror's Office Ministry of Magic"

The fireplace erupted in green flames, and they entered.

 **Somewhere in Muggle London**

He put on his coat. The temperature was coming down. His last meeting had ended well. He saw her twice a month and today was a good session. Nothing too much was on his mind. He told her about the backfire last night and how the kids across the pub had to be veterans. She asked if this was important and he had to concede it was merely odd.

As he jiggled his jacket to find his keys, he was so glad that his wife had insisted he talk to a -5 approved therapist. It was emotional nakedness with a beautiful young woman to save their marriage. He was a smart enough man to go to the knock-out on the directions of his wife. The first year he talked to Janice twice a week and had called her in the middle of the night more than once. Now their talks were more like changing the oil on a car and inflating the tyres when the seasons changed. Maintenance to avoid problems rather than replacing the head gaskets on his 1981 Jaguar.


	4. Chapter 4 Remembrance Day

**Hogwarts Sundown May 2, 2001**

Kingsley Shacklebolt caught his breath. Three more names and he would be done. Three more names and the battle was ever further away. Three more names and memories could be celebrated.

"Elf Tankers"

Almost all of the kitchen elves present bowed their head. She had been one of the sous chefs. The elves had lost heavily when they stormed the flank of the Death Eaters. Most of the elves had been wounded in the hand to hand fighting. Four had been killed, three in the first minute.

"Frederick Weasley"

Molly cried out. Her face was deep in Arthur's shoulders. He held his wife offering strength and taking strength from her. Between the two of them, they could stand. George looked even worse than his mother. Exhaustion from pacing the hallways of St. Mungo's during Angelique's prolonged and eventually successful labor combined with the phantom limb that he forever felt. The past three years had been spent discovering that he was just George instead of FredandGeorge. His brother, his best friend and his twin would never see the new twins; Fredericka and Georgina Weasley. Both her happy and healthy. Fredericka had already managed to spray her mother when she was not expecting a piss. Her namesake had to be having one hell of a laugh in the beyond when he saw the look on his sister in-law's face.

Ginny grabbed Harry's arm and her fingers dug into his tricep. He offered her a pillar just as she had protected him when Remus and Tonks' names were called. Teddy Lupin gave his Auntie Ginnie a hug as he knew hugs were powerful magic when he felt sad and had tears and Auntie Ginnie gave wonderful hugs whenever he hurt himself.

Hermione had engulfed Ron. Her arms were around his waist. Her fingers locked over his wrist. He was in a straitjacket of love. His fiancee leaned against Fleur who held Bill's hand tightly. The brave cursebreakinger and one of the youngest members of the Order of the Phoenix held his squirming daughter. She was poking her father in the face and curious as to why he held a stone face instead of a silly face. She poked more to produce the desired response.

Kingsley looked at the list. It never got shorter. One more name had been added as a centaur had succumbed to her wounds in January. A few witches and wizards had cursed injuries that the Healers could contain and isolate but not cure. They were among the living but they would also be among the memorialized when their lives were shortened.

"And all the others who gave their lives to fight the darkness and bring light into this world, named and unnamed, you will never be forgotten." The broad shouldered Minister of Magic touched his wand to his throat. _Finite_. The voice projection spell faded. He shook his head as this never got easier. The pain got further away every day and he seldom had to confront it except on days like today, but then it was still immediate and visceral. He could be weak after he was publicly strong.

Harry had stepped onto the stage. He had the place of honor today to dedicate the gray granite obelisk that had all the names of the dead carved on its base. A public subscription had been collected over the past eighteen months for the memorial. It had been oversubscribed. The one hundred foot column dominated the lower part of the Hogwarts grounds. It stood sentinel at the crossroad of the Hogsmeade Gate and the path to the renovated Quidditch Pitch. An enchanted lamp would give light along the path to those who were doing well to others.

Harry pulled out parchment. It would be a short speech and it was a cribbed speech that Hermione had helped him prepare. She still helped him with his homework.

"A great Muggle had a similar duty seven generations. His words are far greater than mine ever could be as I see the spectres of our friends and families that we lost. I see Fred Weasley whenever I need to laugh. I see Professor Lupin as I confront the Dark. I see Tankers and Elvo whenever I eat an incredible meal. I see everyone who passed through the veil that day and I hear all those who died in our fight against Voldemort's twisted ideology of hatred and division. I cry as I think of Professor Dumbledore. The bravest man I ever knew and I wish i had known of his bravery before he died lays here, Professor Snape saved us all and protected as many as he could. But let me go back to that Muggle as his words at their greatest battlefield are appropriate here:

 _ **we can not dedicate - we can not consecrate - we can not hallow - this ground. The brave men, women, wizards and witches, elves and centaurs, giants and ghosts, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us - that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion - that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain**_

Harry stepped away from the podium. He pulled his childhood wand from its holster and slowly raised it. The hundreds of witches and wizards in the crowd also raised their wands.

"LUMOS"

The lamp was lit for all to use.


	5. Chapter 5 Pub Brawl

**May 10, 2001**

A flash of yellow light went over head. It slammed into an oak tree. A mighty branch shattered. Splinters and shards burst outwards. A few slammed into a suddenly solid black cloak. The man underneath the cloak grunted. He raised his wand and muttered another protective charm and then he disillusioned himself. He ran from the low brick wall that had offered him some cover to a large rock fifteen yards away.

Another flash of light went over his head. It missed high and behind before slamming into a low rising knoll digging up dirt. The nearly invisible man found his cover and relived the image of his lover on top of him that morning telling him she loved him and needed him in her and her life in every way possible. A brilliant stag Patronus canted across the field. A few seconds later a steady stream of red wards erupted from the wand of his partners. More yellow and sputum green colored spells flashed in his direction. They were not close, but they were enough to force his head down.

He crawled forward, his wand out, eyes up and ass down. Progress was slow. He wanted his invisibility cloak but it was not with him today. Years of physical training was paying off as the eighty yard belly crawl was merely a light work-out instead of onerous activity. The Dark wizard had turned his attention to the red locking wards that his partner had been throwing in his direction for the past eight minutes. A few more yards through broken sticks and soft grass allowed him to brace his shoulder against an ash tree. He moved his arm slightly, lining up the Death Eater with the far edge of his wand. He paused for a moment and felt his magic flow through his body, down his arms and into his fingers as the thought "Petrificulus Totalus" erupted. An invisible wind push the first spell aside.

"Damn, the wizard still kept up rear facing wards." He shifted strategies and sent an array of stunners and shield breakers. The Death Eater now was being flanked. His attention was split as the other Auror started to advance as well. A rapid flick of the wrist sent a stream of angry hornets at the greatest threat to the criminal. The dirty Auror slashed back, transfiguring the the dew on the leaves into sticky paper before he sent a jelly leg jinx. The sophomoric jinx worked as it evaded some of the wards that were configured to protect against far more visibly dangerous curses and jinxes.

As the Death Eater's legs wobbled, his wand inadvertently pointed skyward. In under a second a trio of stunners struck him sending him to the ground. As Harry advanced, he muttered his favorite dueling spell - Expelliarmus - and the wand flew from his adversaries hand. Ropes soon bound the barely conscious prisoner. Harry was pawing through the robes of the prisoner while his partner sent an ox Patronus back to headquarters with notification that the target had been neutralized, captured and would be available for interrogation by dinner time.

As soon as the Patronus thundered away, half a dozen Aurors apparated into the park.

"Trainees Potter and Booth, report…."

Harry wiped the sweat from his eyes. He caught his breath and arranged his thoughts in half a second.

"Sir, prisoner has been apprehended. No Muggle casualties, no Auror casualties, no Unforgivables used, and minimal force used. Challenges with this exercise include surprising strength of omni-directional wards, and length of apprehension. Anti-apparition barriers were challenged and I believe would have failed if Trainee Booth had not been able to keep the prisoner fully occupied."

Senior Auror Proudfoot looked at the two dirty and sweaty trainees.

"All that is correct. I see one major error in procedure. The first communication to the rest of the Auror's office was twenty nine minutes after confirmation of the target's identity and forty eight minutes after potential sighting and thirty eight seconds after taking the suspect into custody. Potter, Booth, we are a team. Eight Aurors against one Dark Wizard is far more of an unfair fight than two Aurors against the same Dark Wizard. We don't need to give them a fair chance to kill us."

Harry was not expecting this critique. Aurors had spent centuries fighting against the darkness alone. It was only in the past few years that training material had been generated on the assumption that Aurors would frequently work in pairs. Proudfoot had stumbled multiple times in lectures and demonstrations whenever she had to go over the new material.

"Ma'am, this was a paired combat training exercise… I didn't think that we could call in the rest of the office…"

The older witch looked at her two young trainees with almost maternal tenderness. Sharpness had a role.

"You didn't think. That was the problem. We would have sent back a message saying that there were no available reinforcements but it would have been a sign that you were thinking instead of just doing. Think before do. "

Harry and Terry deflated. She was right. They had caught sight of the target, and they had used all of their training and innate skills to effect a capture but they were not thinking about the bigger picture. Their teacher saw the comprehension on their faces. She suppressed a smile as they needed to learn this lesson.

"Okay you two, get lunch, write up your initial report. We'll debrief at 3:00 and then I believe Dawlish owes you both a Butterbeer as this is the first time he's been taken down by trainees this cycle."

* * *

Hary popped into the garden of his house at the end of the day. The debriefing went well. Overall, the exercise had been a success. He needed to trust his teammates more and that meant more communication. Hermione, if she had been allowed to hear about the debriefing, would have laughed. A moment before he walked up the steps and into his townhouse, he inhaled the roses. Ginny had insisted that a few square yards of the city be part of her country upbringing. Molly and Ginny had spent three weekends straight getting the rose bushes up to snuff. Her mother would spend the first ten minutes of any Teddy Lupin-less visit checking out the roses.

As soon as he stepped inside, a fiery ball of pride and noise hit him.

"Guess what guess what guess what….."

"What?"

"You're supposed to guess!" Ginny was on her toes bouncing. Her hair had been pulled back in a long braided pony tail. She filled out a tight, athletic shirt that was marred with sweat stains from a hard day of training. Her face was flush. Freckles were indistinct because of her excitement, well earned exhaustion and lactic acid discharges.

"Okay, you did not get accepted to Hogwarts as a guest lecture in Potions, nor have you found a house in the country…"

"Silly, what do I always talk about…" Ginny was wriggling around Harry, her arms going over his shoulders and clasping just underneath his firm pectorals. That was the biggest surprise about Harry in the past three years; regular food and regular training had added thirty five pounds of muscle on the frame that had always been under stress and under fed. He would never be as tall as her brother or as visibly muscled as Wood, but he was firm. She squeezed his nipples for the joy of the yelp he produced even as she continued to whisper in Harry's ear: "Still keep on guessing"

Harry paused. He was distracted as he felt his lover's hot breath in his ear and her firm breasts pressing against his back.

"Snogging me… that is always a good topic of conversation…" He did not move his head fast enough. Ginny nibbled on his ear and then as soon as she had the soft lobe firm between her teeth, she yanked.

"Ouch…"

"One track mind"

"Okay, snogging and shagging me"

"One track mind…"

"Like you're not trying to jump my bones every chance you have… may I remind you Ms. Weasley of this morning and how I barely could make it to work on time…"

Harry was playing with fire. Ginny's finger started to poke his ribs….

"Shagging you is just for my enjoyment love, not my obsession… so keep on guessing"

Harry turned and kissed Ginny. It was a quick kiss that could not lead to more as Ginny was laughing as she pushed him away into the kitchen.

"Keep on guessing instead of distracting me with a snog."

"The only thing that you obsess about is Quidditch, so it has to be Quidditch related… U-23s are supposed to get announced next week… did you hear?" Harry spoke the last three words in a whisper. He knew how hard Ginny had been training with the Harpies. She was their lead youngster, but professionals played a completely different game of the same name than Hogwarts house teams.

"I got a Floo today from the Guinevere Motheson, the national team director of player personnel. She asked if I could be in Dover next Tuesday morning for the announcement. They want me as a starting Chaser and reserve Seeker."

He picked her up and engulfed her in his arms. Her toes were off the ground and he spun her in joy and excitement. She had been working so hard for so long. His heart was bursting for her. After a short spin and a long, Kantian snog, he put her down.

"Let's call Ron and Hermione to celebrate." Harry walked over to the telephone and made the call. Ron was trying to use more Muggle technology in his day to day life, and he was thrilled to meet his little sister and best friend at the Copper Cauldron in an hour.

* * *

Hermione smiled.

She did that a lot more this week. Remembrance Day and the week leading up to it had barely gotten easier. Now that the public ceremonies were over, she could go back to being just Hermione instead of a part of the Golden Trio and a WAR HERO. Hermione was still busy being Hermione, she could be little else but that. Half of her time was spent in the Ministry working on sentient being rights. The other half of her time was dedicated to studying at the London School of Economics. Muggles had fractured themselves and broken their societies in civil wars and long transitions as they struggled to adjust the meaning of citizenship. Magical society was facing the same struggles but Hermione was determined to at least try to learn from what the Muggle world had shown could work.

She had turned in three papers today. Two were capstone projects for courses. Her favorite was a study of the economic integration and re-segregation of the African American population in Baltimore after 2nd Muggle World War. The other examined the role of truth and reconciliation commissions in South Africa. This was an ongoing evaluation of near current affairs and the literature was still immature and thin. The third paper was a summarization of a series of focus groups she had conducted with house elves and how they visualized their role and desires in the magical world. She had conducted those focus groups after her first effort on major elvish legislation had failed to gain enough sponsors.

But right now she did not care. She had one more paper to complete. It just needed a formatted bibliography and a final read in the next seven days. Today she could celebrate her friend's joy. And to do that, she needed to grab three more ciders and a bitter at the bar as the single server was overwhelmed. The experienced blond immigrant was in the far corner delivering a pint to the older man Ginny had noticed last week. He was working on a crossword and content within his own world. A few dozen university students had arrived at the pub to celebrate the completion of a particularly atrocious final. They were loud, they were boisterous and they would soon be drunk.

As she was navigating back to the table, Ginny was trying to demonstrate a complex feint with hands, salt shakers and an empty bottle. To anyone else, she was talking like a fighter pilot going over a dogfight. Ron had been drafted to illustrate the position of the opposition Seeker and the Snitch while Harry had removed his arm from her shoulder so that she could move freely. A relaxed smile was on his face as he laughed at the play by the play. His eyes caught hers and he mouthed an offer of help. She nodded and he rose.

Harry was two steps away from grabbing two glasses when she was groped. Hermione stopped and stabilized the tray of drinks in one hand. With her other hand she slashed down in a short chop, spun and saw a drunk young man laughing at her. Her foot slammed into his toes drawing a gasp of pain.

"You fucking bitch, you frigid bitch…"

Harry by now had taken the drinks from Hermione's hands and placed them on a table. The pub crowd attention narrowed as it saw a commotion forming. He stepped in front of Hermione.

"Please apologize to my friend."

"Fuck off wanker, the bitch can't take a compliment…"

"That was not a compliment. It be best if you apologize and then go back to your drink…."

Harry eyed the man in front of him. The groper was larger than Harry and had the obvious muscles of a boy who spent too much time in a gym worrying about his biceps and triceps and not enough time squatting. One of the gropers' friends had come up and occupied the space right behind the asshole's left shoulder. He was trying to pull his friend back as he did not like the look in the eyes of the exceedingly fit and calm man in front of him.

That effort failed. The blond student pulled his chest back and chin up. His arms came up and then pushed forward looking to strike Harry in the chest as the start of a basic primate dominance display. Even before his hands cleared his elbows, Harry struck. His head came down across the bridge of the student's nose. One nostril was crushed. It was not the worst injury. Harry struck hard at the exposed leading knee. A foot crushed the side of the patella and dislocated it several inches out of place. The pub was split by a cry of pain as the amateur football career of the student disappeared. He crumpled to the ground and Harry was readying to drive his toe through his stomach when Hermione pulled him back.

"Harry - back down, we're safe Harry, we're safe…"

The world's speed came back to normal. In that half second, Harry had lived a lifetime. Everything was moving slowly and perfectly as he saw the muscles of the drunk flex and begin to move. The sloppy performative push had opened up his chest for a strike and he had been like a cobra seeing his prey exposed without cover so he struck fast and hard. His arms pushed the drunk's arms to the side and he neutralized the threat…

"Fuck, fuck fuck…."

The drunk's friend looked at the man who had taken his friend out in under a second and decided valor required discretion. He went to aid his friend on the floor who was screaming. Hermione saw the older man who had watched them last week hurry come up to the screaming boy. He grunted something at him. The drunk's friend wrapped him up tight as the older man slammed the dislocated kneecap back into the groove. The pain did not stop, it would not stop for months, but it decreased.

The older man turned and looked at Harry and Hermione. His eyes were not angry. They were alert and suspicious but not angry. His body was tense and anticipatory and then he relaxed before he spoke in a directed whisper to Harry.

"Soldier, you're safe. Let's figure out how to get you out of this heap of trouble…"

Harry looked at the Muggle in front of him. He was a stranger but his response to violence was familiar. He too had learned to react under danger. He too knew how to prioritize. He was someone new but familiar.

"May I?"

Harry nodded and the man put a very strong hand on his shoulder and led Harry to a bench. He guided him to sit and they waited in silence until the police and ambulance came. Ron, Hermione, and Ginny gathered protectively around Harry. As soon as the police came to question Harry, the older man spoke.

"This soldier was defending himself and his friend. He used minimum force to protect himself as soon as he was attacked. Look at the tape and ask the staff what they saw."

An hour later, Harry walked out of the pub with a summons from the police and a business card from the older man if he ever wanted a cup of tea to talk.


	6. Chapter 6 Meeting of Equals

**May 12, 2001**

His sandwich was soggy. The mayo had escaped containment and slid down the lettuce. Worse things had happened to him. This was only slightly better than the week he spent in a Czech whorehouse waiting for a contact to supply him and his team with mission critical intelligence. Now if the can of Coke had crushed his crisps, this ruined day would rank along the thirty six hour resistance and interrogation course from 1981 as all time bad days. Thankfully, his crisps were still intact.

He missed the active duty regiment. Now he had transitioned to the Artist Rifles, a Territorial regiment. He was in the field two weekends a month if he was lucky. But his age and his wife had won the battle against time. He was no longer twenty four and sure of the world. Now, he had a good sports coat hanging on a hook, a fine tie from Harrods around his neck, an assistant he shared with another man a lot like him, and a job working as a senior technical advisor to MI-5. He did not mind the spooks and the counter-spooks; he had worked with them enough times as a snake eater as they found ways to aim the Regiment in usually productive directions. He mainly worked with the counter-terror and hostage teams which kept his nose in quite a few books he had been reading for years.

Mr. Houlihan finished his lunch. As soon as the last bite hit his stomach, he began his third set of one hundred clapping push-ups for the day. Jane, his assistant, knew that she was to keep the world outside of his purview for his lunch break whenever he ate at his desk. She compiled a list of messages and requests at the edge of her desk.

As he finished his last push-up, he wiped the sweat from his brow, re-arranged his tie and looked at his afternoon schedule. Two meetings with his section, a counseling session for a young analyst who was showing promise but needed a good talking to by an NCO as his ideas were still ahead of his capabilities, and then a short walk and talk with his section chief. If all went well, he would be leaving before five. He walked out the door and looked at his messages. The walk and talk had been moved two floors up and half an hour later. He would text his wife on his new mobile once he was out of the secured section. There was a reminder that custodial engineering would be replacing the kitchen over the next bank weekend and all goods needed to be removed or discarded. And then there was a short note in his secretary's very precise handwriting.

"Phone Message 1242 - approx 90 seconds. A Harry Potter called, identified himself as the young man from the Copper Cauldron. Indicated he would like to talk with you. +44 7700 900616. "

Three other messages were left over lunch. Two could be ignored. He returned the last call and resolved a training schedule conflict for a team lead and her trainees. But that very precise note stuck with him.

He dialed the number. A click and then a strange buzzing sound. If he did not know better, he would have thought that he was calling a secured and encrypted telephone. That was nonsense. Those were rare and unusual within Her Majesty's government and even rarer in the private sector. And if he did not know the boy by sight, he was not working for Her Majesty's government.

"Good afternoon, this is Penelope Oakley, may I ask who is calling and who you are attempting to reach."

The voice was clear, professional and slightly aloof. Mr. Houlihan could picture a fifty eight year old matron controlling the front desk and the communication of A Squadron in his head. She was a battle-ax who took care of the blades and acted as a filter to the rest of the world. Why would he be calling her long lost sister or worse, her mother?

"This is Mr. Houlihan, I am returning a call from a Harry Potter, he had called my office approximately half an hour ago. I can leave a message."

"No dear, I'll get Harry." He heard a chair wheel squeak and then bizarre mandolin hold music. It had an unusual rhythm that if he did not know better was closer to a fourteenth century French lay than any Muzak available in Britain today. Two minutes later, the music stopped.

"Mr. Houlihan, Harry is coming in a moment. I apologize for the wait."

No transfer, no secondary line? That was odd. Even MI-5 would allow outside calls to be transferred from the central switchboard. Most of those calls would be sent to the Gray Phones, which were unsecured. Red phones were far less likely to be used as they guaranteed end to end encryption.

As his mind started to wander, a tentative voice came through the other end.

"Hello Mr. Houlihan, this is Harry Potter, I really wanted to thank you for your help last week."

"Not a problem, I always try to help young soldiers when they have a spot of trouble that they did not cause with the law."

"Why do you think I'm a soldier?" The voice on the other end of the phone was quiet and questioning. He was surprised at the surprise. The technique young Mr. Potter had used at the pub was not particularly skilled. The US Marines had an extremely simple basic hand to hand combat philosophy based on getting an opponent onto the ground before stomping on his head. There were several methods of putting someone on the ground and a few preferred stomping techniques, but the bloody American leathernecks focused on aggression over refined technique. Harry did not even use the limited techniques the American Marines taught, but his decisiveness would be at home at Camp Lejeune and Parris Island.

"I just thought you were, I saw a younger version of myself in you last week at the pub. I had gotten into more than a few scraps when I was young and protecting the fairer sex."

He did not anticipate the laugh. It was a laugh that started in the throat and quickly moved to the lungs and then the belly. "Hermione, needing protection…. That is absurd, Merlin's beard, she's protected me enough times… he needed the protection from her…."

Harry paused and then guffawed one last time. The idea that Hermione needed protection from a Muggle arsehole was ridiculous, it was almost enough to destroy a boggart. He caught his breath.

"Thanks Mr. Houlihan, I appreciate the help. I had a brief discussion with the magistrate and the responding officer. We've cleared things up. Could I buy you a pint tonight?"

This was not the discussion that Houlihan thought he would have had when he picked up the phone. The young man acted like a soldier, walked like a soldier and struck like a warrior, but he disclaimed that and then his friend, Hermione… an interesting name... was evidently even tougher than he was, or at least he thought so.

"I could do with a pint tonight…"

"When and where could you meet, I'm flexible." Harry had a study session and a practical curse breaking demonstration that afternoon. Ginny was on a quick PR tour following the announcement of her selection to the England U-23 National team so his bed would be empty tonight. Ron was stuck on a stake-out while Hermione was revising. No one who liked their eyes intact would interrupt her while revising for anything less than an Inferi insurrection. A pint and a laugh could be interesting.

"How about 7:00 at the Royal Oak"

"Sure, that's the one right on King's Terrace?"

"Yes, I'll find you. "

The phone suddenly went dead. Houlihan looked at the ceiling for a minute. He saw that his assistant had returned.

"Jane come in"

His assistant entered the office. She smiled at Mr. Houlihan, he kept her work interesting and he had been more than willing to trust her to do her job well while building her up to be a future analyst. She ran his life from the moment he entered the building until he left. His wife ran his life in the off-hours. They frequently coordinated to make sure that he believed he still had his independence and autonomy. The older woman was grateful that she had a co-conspirator in the young, recent university graduate. At some points, Jane believed that Mr. Houlihan knew he was being run by the two women in his life, but at others, she had to believe in his happy ignorance.

"Yes sir, need anything?"

"Clear your schedule this afternoon. I need three things; call my wife and tell her I won't be home until late. Second, please arrange for a dozen pink roses to arrive at 5:00pm - I have not sent her flowers for little reason in a while, and this is enough of a reason to remind her that I love her. Use my credit card that you have taped the information on the side of the bottom drawer on the right. Finally, once that is done, conduct a public records search for the following individuals…"

"Public records or a tier 1 search, sir?" A tier 1 search would provide some more information but it required a justification and approval to look at some details of an individual's interaction with the government and NHS.

"Just public records, right now I have an itch and I can't justify anything beyond a public records search from an itch… but I want you to scratch it."

"Yes sir."

The former sergeant major and now technical consultant for MI-5 grimaced internally. He worked for a living. He hated to be called sir and that was one of the ways that Jane gently tweaked him. He was respectable now and an eminence gris instead of a doer. He could revert back to being a gruff doer one or two weekends a month and a week during the summer but that part of his life was behind him. She had, by now, of course, quickly grabbed a pen and a notebook.

Can you look into the following individuals: Harry Potter, age 18 to 22 and Hermione Granger same age. Mr. Potter is from Surrey while Ms. Granger sounds like she is from the Home Counties. A few of their other friends are interesting as well, but I don't have names for them yet.

"E-R… I'll get this to you before I leave. "

"Thanks Jane, you're a gem. We need to set up time for your review soon, so coordinate that with yourself and before we do that, block out two or three hours of my time to write my thoughts up."

The Tube ride was short. It was crowded and loud. He had more questions now than he had at lunchtime. Jane was thorough and creative. She needed to be promoted and challenged.

Harry James Potter was born in 1980, orphaned in 1981 as his parents were killed in a car crash. His mother's sister and her family took him in. His foster family was blandly normal. He went to the local primary school, had been in a trio of picture captions celebrating artistic success as a seven and eight year old as well as a good Cow #2 when he nine during the Christmas Pageant. In 1991, he disappeared. There were no public records. He just disappeared.

Hermione Jean Granger was even odder. She was born in 1979 to a pair of dentists. She had won several prizes as a young student. There were no educational records from 1991 to 1999. She had enrolled at LSE and was receiving no visible support. Her parents owned a small dentistry clinic just north of London. Her mother specialized in endodontics while her father maintained a general practice with a focus on children. There was a small advertisement Jane had found and she had called to inquire about an appointment for her mythical seven year old daughter. She said the receptionist was pleasant and sounded fond of Richard Granger and as Jane probed, the receptionist told her that the clinic had been at that address for the past eight years. Hermione had a driver's license and was insured through her parents' policy.

What had happened to these two people? They fell off the face of the earth for eight or more years. And then they started showing up at one of his favorite pubs a little more than a year ago. Hermione was almost always eye fucking the tall gangly redhead, while Harry had to constantly struggle to keep his hands off the buxom redhead while they thought anyone was looking. Those redheads needed to be looked into, as they behaved the same way as Harry and Hermione, but he did not have enough to start a trace on them.

He wondered if they were foreign agents taking the life skins of children who had died a decade ago. It was an old play and a successful one as the documentation could be made to work, and both Harry and Hermione looked like people who were completely memorable only to those who cared about them, but otherwise would be easy enough to think that one knew them a decade ago if a low level background check was going on. If they were seeded with cash and an education at LSE, they could find ways to crawl the underbelly of the British and global elite. But that did not add up as today's phone call made no sense under that scenario.

The tube station was crowded as he exited the train. The walk to the surface was rapid and he soon was scanning the few blocks to the pub looking for any tails or observation teams. A professional team could easily remain hidden, but there were marks and tells of anything less than a full professional operation. A man at kibob stand fumbled for some change and glanced a moment too long in his direction, but other than that, he saw nothing. That could have been a coincidence, but survival hated assuming a coincidence.

As he entered the pub, his eyes adjusted to the low light. This was a third choice pub for him; the prices were always a little more than he appreciated and the service was a tad slower and more surly than it was at the Copper Cauldron. He nodded to the bar keep as he kept on turning his head. The first spot he looked was empty. It was a small table with a bench leaning against the wall and a chair on the open side of the bar floor. Someone sitting in the bench could see the front door, the pathway to the emergency exit and the kitchen. It was an obvious spot for someone who was professionally paranoid.

He smiled as he saw Harry. He had chosen a small nook that still provided full visibility to the entry and exit ways. More importantly, it was close to the waitresses' normal path which meant better service and more people nearby. For people who could speak quietly, they could converse without fear of being overheard amongst the general din of a pub without making it obvious that they were plotting. The old commando raised his right hand in greeting and Harry tipped a half empty glass of ale back at him.

As he made his way over to the seat, Harry held up two fingers to the waitress and she nodded. By the time he was within a step of the table, Harry had risen and reached out for a friendly forcep grasping handshake. Strength measured strength and found peers.

"Good evening Sergeant Houlihan, I'm happy that you helped me last week"


	7. Chapter 7 Revelations

The young man knew who he was. He should not have known. This was disconcerting. His mind raced. He replayed the brief conversation last week. He knew he had given his name and given his profession, but never his rank. Was this a guess, an experienced veteran being able to tell who the sergeants were versus the officers? Or was he being collected against?

The two pints arrived and he took a sip of the cool bitter. The act of drinking was a natural pause in the conversation. It was a moment of normality. Across the table, the young man had closed his eyes and enjoyed the first two sips of the pint. He was relaxed and as he put the glass down, he smiled and mumbled.

"Muggles get that one right…"

"Muggles" That was a strange phrase. It rattled in Houlihan's head as he put his glass down. It was not a new phrase. He had heard it before. He just did not know when. It had to have been a while ago. He closed his eyes and opened up his memory palace. His mind took a brief walk down a hallway, a crystal palace of rooms and displays. Up the stairs he went and he opened a book - Fall 1982 - just after his Squadron had returned from the Falklands and a young man, slightly older than the almost brand new blade, had been attached to the Squadron for a mission to Beirut.

What was that boy's name -Drawlsey, no- Dawlish; almost completely forgettable except for how lucky he seemed to be. Within a week, no one played cards against him. He had managed to pull four consecutive gut shot straights to pocket over two hundred pounds of winnings. He had been with the team for six weeks and then he disappeared as soon as the mission was over. He was good; level headed in a firefight, accurate and amazingly lucky. An Druse militia had their position suppressed with RPGs and a heavy machine guns but somehow no one had been wounded and Dawlish had led the counter-attack that had re-opened the escape route to the sea. And then he disappeared and was never seen again. During the charge against the foxhole containing the heavy machine gun, the young sergeant had heard Dawlish curse or at least it sounded like a curse : "Muggles making things hard…." He, personally, was swearing in a way that would have made his pa, an old gunner from HMS Blake, proud while his ma would have been seeking out soap for his mouth.

"Harry, tell me, when was the first time you were in combat?"

"Why do you think I've been in combat?" Harry's eyes were steady but his words were quick and nervous.

"You're a veteran. The signs are clear. Your eyes never stop moving, you sat here tonight and you and your friends' favorite table at the Copper Cauldron has clear lines of sight to all doors while having some cover. Last week, when I heard a bang, you and all of your friends were getting ready for a fight. And then when the arse harassed your friend, you were decisive. Most young men your age, can I guess, 20 or 21, would have been performative in their threat displays. He was; he was merely trying to look big and scary. And then you declined to play that game with ruthless violence. You saw a threat and you saw a way to neutralize that threat. He expected words and puffery. You saw danger and a path out of that danger for you and your friends. That is a combat veteran who knows that there is no glory in violence, only a job to do and a mission to accomplish. "

Harry's face was blank as he listened. He wished Hermione was here to logically distract the sergeant or Ginny could squeeze his hand and give him confidence. Ron would have just ordered a few more beers and appetizers as food was almost never a bad idea. The beer was getting warm as he held the glass in his hand.

"Where would I have learned that, sergeant?" His voice was low, urgent and confident. "The UK has been at peace since 1991, and I was just getting ready for school, I think I had long division of fractions the day that the Gulf War started. There was the possibility of fighting in Serbia a few years ago, but where would I have learned to fight? "

""That son is why I've been watching you… you shouldn't know what you know."

"Ah, I am the man who never was there… what if I was seventy five and merely was a vampire who never aged?"

"Then your cover would be exceptional. The public records have you and Ms. Granger being born a few months apart. You went to a local school in Surrey until age 11 and then you just disappeared. Your bank records popped up on the grid again last year."

"So if I was a vampire, I could have the experience to build a good cover."

Harry's mind was whirring. The man in front of him could see that he was a black hole. The emptiness was the information.

"I can take you to the A&E as they have to have a few pints of Type A if that is more to your taste" Houlihan laughed at the idea that this young man with too many scars could be a vampire. That was merely fiction one read at the airport or in the field during a rainy exercise weekend.

"Nah… too coppery, don't like the taste of Type A. Now type B… that is the good stuff…. So what about your Sergeant Houlihan… what do you know about combat?"

"Too much to talk about in a pub. I know there is no glory. I know there is nothing to combat that the recruiters and the press want to highlight. I know I was scared shitless every time I was under fire, hoping that someone could not shoot straight and that the explosion would happen just a few feet too far away to keep me safe. I know what a small intestine feels like. I know the sound of life transitioning to death. I know the mission matters more than me, and I know that my wife fears my dreams almost as much as I do… I know boy, and I know you know that too."

Harry sat in silence. His glass was empty now and he had no memory of how that happened. Behind his eyes, he heard Hermione being tortured by Bellatrix, he felt Cedric's body slowing him down as he ran for the portkey in the graveyard. The lightweight coffin of Colin dug into his shoulder. Ginny's tears and shakes rattled his chest from her nightmares. Ron's scream as the locket resisted their attempts to destroy that fragment of the broken soul of a monster echoed in his head. The quiet of Kings' Cross the moment before Dumbledore arrived for their last conversation pushed Hermione and Ron's voices aside.

"Yeah, I know death, I know how a mission can overwhelm." His words were barely audible. His eyes were looking at a point just short of the center of the table. His neck was bent and his shoulders slumped.

"Harry, I know, boy, do I know…." Houlihan's hand reached across the table and grasped the forearm of his new comrade in arms. "I know, I know…."

They sat there quietly for a minute. The waitress ignored them as she knew she would be interfering. Little was said. Harry did not know what to say, he had knowingly been at war since he was eleven and had been fighting the Dark Arts since he could barely walk. This was his life, and it was what he knew. Houlihan said little either, as his words would not matter. He had found a comrade in arms. He had found another man who put mission above all else and had paid the price for daring to win.

"So where did you fight?"

"I can't tell you… bound by secrecy oaths… you?

"Same here on both counts."

"Another beer?" Houlihan raised his hand. The waitress quickly came by and exchanged the empty glasses for full ones. The two veterans clinked the glasses and started to talk and drink.

"How do you know so much about me?" Harry asked curiously.

"I was curious and I started to poke around. You are invisible. That is odd. I'm buried fairly well but my life still pops up frequently. I pay my bills, I owe taxes, I like the occasional pint. I use NHS services. My kids are in school. You've disappeared in 1991, and now I see only a sporadic wire into your bank account every few months for several thousand pounds. I could not find education records, I could not find employment records. You have an NHS card, but not an assigned doctor. You're almost invisible." The older man was still thinking as he was speaking. If Harry was older, in his thirties, he would have been thinking that he was a foreign operative, but there was no mentor, no ideological guidance counselor, nothing visible keeping him anchored to a foreign power.

"I'm merely discrete… what else would one expect to see?"

This was a major security threat. More and more of the Wizarding World was living on both sides of the border. It was no longer just Muggleborns and Halfbloods. Ron was trying his hardest to live with Hermione in a university student district. Luna was splitting her time between worlds as well. Even some of the Slytherins who had held their neutrality in the war were venturing outside of Diagon Alley or Kings Cross. Paperwork had always been a problem. Quick confounding charms and pointed obliviations had been sufficient before. Hermione had used the phrase "pragmatic invisibility" to describe how older Halfbloods had danced between worlds. Was that still possible in a Muggle world where everything was being connected and presence was detected far more frequently? A quick spell to insert a new line on a parish register would no longer be sufficient if that register was linked to a dozen different data tables that were validated and backed-up every night.

"A lot more. Even your friend Hermione has more bread crumbs. I can find her parents. I could not find yours beyond an obituary for both of them and a birth announcement for your mother. I only looked for a few hours this afternoon. But your friend also has tremendous gaps. And your lovers, they are utterly invisible until last year. "

Harry leaned forward. His hand gripped his wand.

"What do you know about Ginny?" He growled through his teeth, ready to pounce at once.

"Even less than I know about you. I know she has seen combat. I know that she is a leader. I know that she adores you. I know that she is on your motorcycle insurance and has a permit. And I know nothing else. Same with her brother…"

"How do you know…."

"Their hair, their noses, their annoyance at each other reminds me of the fights I had with my little sister. Either they are siblings or they are the best actors I've ever seen."

Harry relaxed a little. Houlihan noticed that he was under threat during his spiel. It was a very disciplined threat. A slight movement under the table, a muscle in Harry's neck not relaxing as it should, a narrowing of the eyes and a slight bobbing of the head. He was quite confident of his ability to go hand to hand against almost anyone in the world, and he was even more confident against Harry having seen his lack of training. Aggression could be deadly, but skilled aggression was guaranteed lethal. And then he relaxed as he saw Harry relax.

"We need to talk some more Sergeant Houlihan of the regiment and MI-5." Harry paused as he let go of his information. Houlihan barely reacted beyond taking another sip. His work at MI-5 was not a state secret but it was closely held. Almost everyone working there never talked about their jobs until Parliament requested information. Harry knew too much.

"I know you were the senior sergeant with the regiment. I know you've fought in the Falklands, Beirut, Pilsen, Gibraltar, Derry, Iraq, Kuwait, Mogadishu, Srebrenica, Sarajevo, Pristina, Port Said, and a dozen other places I can neither pronounce nor spell. I know you are thorough. I know that you visit your mates who have been wounded and discharged. I know you love your wife. I know you love your children. I know you have seen things that few others have seen and even fewer have survived. I know that. And I know that we need to talk, but not tonight, let's finish our beer and take a walk."

"Aye sir"

The two men drank.


	8. Chapter 8 Silence is deadly

_As always, this world is JKR's and I'm just playing with it._

 **Chapter 8**

 **May 13, 2001**

 **Ministry of Magic**

"We have a problem."

Harry looked at his mentor and her boss. Senior Auror Proudfoot and Head Auror Gawain Robards were both trying to wake up. She held a cup of Turkish coffee in a silver cup under her nose while the chief was waiting for his morning Pepper-up to take effect. They had dropped everything that they had been preparing to work on when they saw the sticky note (a wonderful Muggle invention that the department was adopting with the new class of trainees being the lead champions) on their doors in the morning. Harry had never invoked his right to see senior leadership; it was a right that the most junior auror trainee was told about on the third day of training. If they could survive the physical and the first day of combat training, they were far enough in the process to be given the right to their own judgement. Some trainees had used it for trifling matters. Others had never used it.

"The Muggles can find us too easily. I was talking with a Muggle warrior last night and he made the point very clear that I was notable because I was invisible."

"Harry, did you Obliviate him?" Gawain was an old school auror. He had made his bones in the first war and the immediate aftermath. He had never used the Unforgivables even as he brought in a dozen Death Eaters before the fall of Voldemort and another half a dozen after the initial fall of the Dark Lord. He had gone into hiding during the second war. Some aurors went into the Muggle world for protection, others, like him, went under Fidelius. The old school methods were what he knew. The youngsters were a different beast for him.

"No, it would not have mattered if I had. He had notes and he had discussed the situation with at least his assistant. I could not destroy or alter his notes nor obliviate his assistant. Obliviating him would have just told him or his colleagues that something even stranger than a physical ghost is out there."

"Harry, are you sure you kept within the Statue?" Proudfoot had been his lead trainer for years and knew that Harry was extremely mission-focused at the expense of many of the details. She knew that Harry was intimately familiar with the Unforgivables. She knew that Harry had broken into Gringotts. She knew that there was a streak of reckless ruthlessness in her mentee. It was not quite as pronounced a streak as the one that Ms. Granger , who truly scared the senior auror, but she had spent two years to get Harry to think before acting.

"I'm sure. I'll put all of last night into the Pensieve. We mainly talked about being veterans. I did not say anything about where or who I had fought. He said very little. The dossier put together by the Muggle Intelligent and Liason Team was excellent. We've bounced into him a few times. Dawlish spent a few months with him just after the first war actually."

"What should we do?" Robards was thoughtful. He was an old fuddy duddy but the line Aurors respected him for when he asked a question, he actually listened to the answers.

"I don't know sir; we need to figure out how we create a better cover. We can't just obliviate our way out of difficulties. That is too late and too obvious now."

"Very well Potter, I want a draft plan on how to hide an auror in Muggle London by the seventeenth of next month. Good work, and you know what good work get you?" Robards was smiling now as he waited for the automatic response.

"Good work leads to more work sir" Harry smiled. There was no rest for the conscientious.

Margo was sprawled cat like on the couch. Her long brown hair with a few streaks of gray hung off the far end of the couch in the small central London apartment. Half a dozen reports were stacked and marked on the end table. A cup of tea was losing its warmth next to a fascinating paper on delayed treatment initiation for prostate cancer among some sub-populations of elderly men. She was marking the methods section of an article she had to review. Even as her highlighter circled a questionable assumption about log linked gammas, she sighed. Her John, strong, proud, independent John, started to rub her feet.

She lost her spot in the referee report. His thumbs worked her arches. His fingers pulled on her toes. His hands engulfed her feet and she could feel the tension of an on-call day disappear. Ten minutes later, her feet were soft and malleable and relaxed. She smiled at her husband of twenty odd years. He smiled back, wanting everything and wanting nothing in his eyes. He was at peace. His reality at the moment was only her, his focus was her left arch and heel, now her left Achilles.

"Umm honey, this is great… what's on your mind?" She knew the singleness of his focus felt amazing as all the stress of the day left her feet. The single mindedness was also how her husband cleared his head when he was thinking. Sometimes she was the beneficiary of that focus. Other times it was an extensive collection of fish flies that he almost never used but rarely sold which benefited from his need to allow his mind to go blank. And then he sometimes would run an impromptu half marathon with a half combat pack to flush the thoughts out of his head and into some semblance of order.

"Harry Potter and Hermione Granger and Ginerva Weasley and Ron Weasley are all on my mind. None of them exist but they are all too real." John Houlihan's hands never stopped moving. His thumbs went from heel to toe. His wife sighed as a tense muscle finally released.

She smiled at the man she had grown and matured with. She smiled at the man who was the father of her children. She promised much with eyes that still were excited to see him without a shirt. She waited in silence as one of the smarter men she knew needed the silence to finish processing out the thoughts that were still half formed. He was decisive, he was in charge, he was in command and he was also an introvert. New blades to the regiment would never believe that of the old man who had done and seen things none of them would imagine were possible for years, but the fast mind underneath the rough exterior needed time to slow down.

He looked at his wife. He saw her smile. He smiled as his fingers still kneaded her fasciitis; stretching out the hard tissue until it was supple and soft again. Even as the balls of her feet relaxed, his mind swirled as brilliant streams of thought intersected in multi-spectral bursts. They were not spies, but they looked like they had exceptional cover stores that the old KGB would have been proud to brag about over a vodka in a sauna in Siberia. Harry knew too much about him for him to be merely an oddity of no consequence. They all were oddities of some consequence, the question was of what.

And more importantly, they were all veterans who had seen the elephant too many times. They had seen luck take one friend and leave another unharmed. They had all seen missions that were nearly impossible and they paid the price to achieve that mission. They were predators on the loose who did not need to hunt. They were prey in the city who had no predators to fear. They were an enigma.

"Honey, what would you say if someone just disappeared from all records for a decade, and then pops back in?"

"Isn't that basically what you did?" She remembered the blacked out faces of team photographs, she remembered having to lie about what her husband did when coworkers at the hospital asked what her husband did. She remembered telling their children to just say that Pa was a consultant. He was a consultant who could jump out of a plane at 25,000 feet or swim three hundred meters without taking a breath. They were nearly invisible from the rest of society to protect him and the entire family; the IRA hotheads had always poked around at taking shots at SAS members and their families; Spetsnaz and GRU agents most likely scouted the villages in along the Marches to assess readiness and to prepare for assassinations and ambushes if war ever came to Western Europe again. They had lived quiet lives where every day living was laundered like the grass stained knees on their son's jumper - quietly, patiently and in deep cold water.

"Nah, those records were only the public face we had. And we still existed. Your NHS number never changed, your medical license has been constant and we still paid our taxes on time and in full. These four, there is nothing until last year for two of them and very little for the other two."

"So like a bomber under the sea?"

"Yeah… I like that. They're on a V patrol. Deep and silent until they chose to come up for whatever reason… I've read that the navy is worried that those bombers are too quiet and too undetectable. Something in Janes about how the next generation of Trident could be found by looking for the emptiness of sound instead of the presence of sound…." He paused and thought. He knew these black holes now existed. He had to submit a report to his superior as this was an actual threat instead of merely a personal curiosity. That could be done tomorrow.

His hands never stopped moving over his wife's leg. She was still smiling as her husband's mind had finally finished chewing over his thoughts. She stretched some more and shifted ever so slightly so that his strong fingers could continue to release all the tension in her muscles, but now his mind could focus solely on her instead of his thoughts.

 **Muggle London**

"Last set, make it good, hold yourself in the hole for a four count; five reps in three, two one"

Half a dozen women walked underneath heavily loaded barbells. Their hair was matted. Sweat soaked shirts. One grunted as she took the load onto her shoulders. The rest took deep breaths. Soon the barbells descended. Each woman held the squat as deep as she could for a four count. Most managed to put their butts to their ankles while one managed to sink all the way to the floor.

The first rep was straightforward. The second time was not particularly difficult. One woman failed at the third repetition while two more barely completed four and did not attempt the fifth. The tallest woman sank into the deep squat and was stuck until she rolled the heavily laden bar off her back. The last two women sank, stayed and then fought to rise. They racked their bar and gave each other a high five to celebrate their success.

Twenty minutes later, Ginny left the locker room. A cold drink, a hot shower, and a protein shake had taken the worst of the initial pain out of her legs. That fifth rep of the fifth set was an ass killer. She knew that her thighs and hips would feel like she had been Crucioed by an incompetent tomorrow morning. However, this Muggle training had been paying off. Some wizards but even fewer Quidditch playing witches cared about their strength. She had put on a few pounds and it slowed her ever so slightly on her broom, but almost no one could knock her off course now. It had been two years since she had been knocked off her broom. Other Chasers were more skilled once they got the Quaffle in their hands, but few of them could fight through defenders like she could. It was a brute force method, and it was not a unique secret but so far, few Quidditch professionals were spending time at a Muggle gym moving iron.

Sally Ann, the tall woman who had barely failed on the fifth rep, waved at Ginny. The blond and the redhead had become friends, or at least more than work out partners. Sally Ann had introduced Ginny and Harry to several blokes she had fancied over the past year. Ginny and Harry had taken Sally Ann out to dinner every few weeks and had even sprung for a tiny one bedroom apartment as a Muggle facing living arrangement. The studio was connected to Grimmauld Place and Harry and Ginny could Floo over in a second as soon as the door detection charms indicated that they had guests. It was a chink in the armor of the Fidelius Charm but it was an acceptable risk.

Ginny waved back at her friend who now had to hurry to an accounting class.

She slowly walked down the sidewalk. Muggle London was still an amazing assault on her senses. It was far less confusing now than even two years ago when she and Harry started to go beyond the wards of Grimmauld Place and outside the confines of Diagon Alley and the Leaky Cauldron. Then she was a foreigner in her national capital. Everything about her screamed tourist from her inability to pay for a cup of tea to the three times when she was almost run over by a double-decker bus.

Now Muggle London was merely big and loud and amazing and confusing. She could be anonymous here. She was no more than a good looking young woman who attracted a few too many catcalls and crude comments. The most aggressive Muggle arseholes lost their balance and their dignity when they would not take her disengagement or a sharp retort as a hint. But this was the life of Muggle-born, it was barely different except for the words in the Wizarding World. She loved it all, as she hurried down the street, checking her purse to make sure she had a few pounds available. As she turned the corner, she felt a twinge of pain as an adductor muscle twitched and froze in place for a step and then she relaxed as her favorite curry restaurant was filling the quiet street with amazingly rich smells. The Guptas were potion masters who merely made magic with food. They could enlighten her senses, remove her from this world, and create incredible vivid memories with spices and beans and love along with a pressure cooker and a large range.

"The regular, luv?"

She smiled and nodded as she handed the standard fee over. She took her seat by the window and pulled out a romance novel. She needed new ideas to try with Harry. A few pages later, her curry magically appeared underneath her nose. The rich, savory scents soothed her and took her away for a moment. She paused and thanked her server and then started to eat.

As she ate, a dozen more customers came through. Most she recognized. One she did not.

A young woman, a few inches taller than Ginny and almost as fit stood in line. Her eyes, deep blue, almost purple, darted back and forth. Her feet moved nervously, hands and elbows darting out whenever someone came to close to her. A bubble of space surrounded her. Ginny looked harder as something about her was familiar. Her hair was blue and purple, a professional dye job, her lips were full and her nose slightly off centered as if it had broken and set by a field medic rather than an A&E physician. She wore a long black dress that hugged her full, almost unnatural, form. Three quarter length sleeves covered most of her arms, but a dragon fire tattoo snuck out along her well muscled right forearm. She placed an order for the house special and water.

She looked over at Ginny. Ginny did not look down. The oddity of not being embarrassed at being caught staring made the young woman look harder at Ginny. Suddenly tears came to her eyes even as her mouth erupted in an honest smile. Ginny saw all the little wrinkles and micro muscles move in joy; reading people had saved her more than once. It was a skill that living with Fred and George had taught her as good pranksters needed to know what they could get away with before bringing the hammer of either the law or Mom down upon them. Ron, now that he had the emotional range of at least a pint glass, was starting to pick up this skill, but Ginny had been able to read the dinner table since she was old enough to cut up her own food.

Her eyes narrowed some more and then she stepped away from the counter. Four steps, three steps, and Ginny's hand was on her wand, gripping it lightly and mentally ready to throw a Protego. As the young woman came within a step, her mouth opened.

"Ginny, Ginny Weasley, is that you?"

Ginny was stunned. And then as she heard the voice, she no longer saw a young woman, confident and assured in navigating Muggle London. Instead she saw a fifteen year old witch crying in her arms. She saw a body that could barely move and a soul fracturing against her.

Ginny had held her as Luna treated her as well a she could for the injuries the Hufflepuff fifth year had incurred in a detention that started with Crucios and ended with half of Slytherin riding her like a school broom. She was the first student evacuated once Neville figured out that the Hogs Head was an emergency exit.

"Leah? You look better! How are you doing? We never saw you again"

"Ginny!" She pulled up her old schoolmate and gripped her tightly. Strong shoulders pulled her in as Ginny hugged back. Her hands quickly moved up and down Leah's body and could not find a wand. Perhaps it was strapped to her thigh or calf, but most witches wanted easy access to their wands in case of an emergency. Ginny held the evacuee even as deep sobs came out of her body.

"You're okay, you're safe, we're safe… we're safe…. We're safe. You're safe… you're safe with me " Ginny whispered this mantra into Leah's ear and soon, the full body binding grip relaxed and her sobs became slightly shallow and rapid breaths and she sat.

"Ginny, I never thought I would see you again. I'm so happy, I can't talk long, I have to get back to the set in a few hours for another scene. The riggers screwed up and needed to rerun some things so I have a break…"

Their lunch arrived and Leah ate like she had not seen food in weeks. Ginny still saw Ron, Hermione and Harry eat like that too. The scars would never readily heal. Little was said beyond the most basic. Leah knew that the war had ended and Harry had somehow been the victor. She knew Hogwarts had nearly been destroyed in the final battle. She was staying away from the magical world as she did not know if a mediocre Mudblood would ever be welcomed or feel safe in it again. Her watch beeped and she ate two more bites of the vindaloo curry before she gave Ginny her number.

Ginny waved at the young woman who had gone through so much during the war. She would call tonight after Quidditch training. Tea would be wonderful.


	9. Chapter 9 -- Therapy Session

**May 18, 2001 Muggle London**

"And that's a wrap"

Tangled bodies moved slowly apart. Fit men and women relaxed and rose. Leah was the last one off the floor. Two of her friends and coworkers had her at the wrist and elbow and she was launched towards the sky. The camera lights were shutting down.

She caught her breath and landed on her feet. She was ready to dance as this was the last scene on the schedule. Everything after this would be the responsibility of the director. She would approach the experienced director after her shower as she needed to know what happened behind the camera. Her looks would guarantee her a job for at least a decade but if she wanted this to be her career, she would need to understand the entire business. It was the difference between being a professional and being merely a pretty face.

"Hey Leah, you planning to come to Munich with us this weekend?" Annabeth yelled across the set. She had her robe on and was sipping a bottle of water and eating a banana. Annabeth had helped Leah enter the industry a few years ago. A year ago, she had started to work with Leah on freelance gigs on the Continent. Those weekends tended to be exhaustingly lucrative.

"No plans, going to keep Warlock on my lap and put my feet up." Some of the girls had been talking about a gig in Amsterdam and if this was any other week, that sounded like a good time. The more experienced and better paid thespians had reservations for Munich. The beer was good but the work was harder there. A pair of shows and rent would be paid for a month.

"You sure? We can always fit you in…." Annabeth looked at the young woman who she had unintentionally but retrospectively quite happily taken in as a mentee. She saw herself a decade earlier. Then, a few older women who looked out for a naive young girl who was finding a way to make a living and a name for herself in a brutal industry. Somehow they had kept her safe, sane and working as often as she wanted to work. Some years that was almost every week and other years she built in time. Now the mother of two had a third, unofficial child who was trying to find her way in the world. At least Leah would allow Annabeth to experience raising teenagers early enough so that she had the energy to keep up.

"Nah, I'm good, I need a quiet weekend… next time you're putting together a crew, I'll go… I promise, pinky swear" Leah offered her little finger to the older woman. She matched and the two women squeezed each other tight. Leah went to the showers and half an hour later, she left the building after a brief discussion with the director. She needed to show up tomorrow morning at nine and promise to only ask questions and bring tea during the initial editing sessions.

The sun was trying to poke through the clouds in the early afternoon. A snappy tune from some American pop band filled the air around her without any thought. She bounced down the sidewalk and created a space from all of the people hurrying between offices for the last few hours of work before the weekend. Eleven blocks later, a mirror came out of her bag. She brushed a few stray blue hairs back into place, re-applied brilliant black lipstick and caught her breath. She walked up the steps of the brownstone and went to a small third floor office.

The receptionist smiled as Leah signed in. This was a comfortable spot, it was warm, bright red window treatments framed floor to ceiling openings while blue and green abstract art hung on the walls. The pieces were well done, not expensive but simply well executed dances of life. Leah bonelessly melted into a chair and waited.

Seven minutes later, the receptionist looked over her desk. The young woman was in a deep trance. Her lips were moving slowly. Her red painted fingernails clenched the hem of her skirt. Her calf high boots tapped the ground lightly. A bead of sweat hung on her forehead. The receptionist had seen her like this for several years, far less frequently now than when she first started to come to the office. The older woman's stomach always tightened when she saw a young girl trying to be brave in the face of a public that did not know her.

"Leah, Dr. Renford is ready to see you" She was not sure where her voice came from, clear, clean and strong. Leah took one more deep breath and stilled herself. Deliberately she rose, brushed her skirt pleats down and went back to her therapist's office. She soon made herself comfortable and took out a small notebook from her purse. Her fingers brushed against a thin oak wand, eight and three quarters with a thestral tail at the core. It tingled with power and purpose even as she seldom if ever used it.

She had escaped Hogwarts with her wand and the clothes on her back. During that hideous the first year, she lacked the ability to control her magic plus she still had the Trace. Even after she lost the Trace, she had become adept at living in the Muggle world and the allure of magic faded like the bruises on her shoulders and back from her first lover. It still spoke to her, as the wand chose the witch as much as the witch chose the wand, but the magic that once gleefully flowed through the strong wood was quieter and less bubbly now. It was a cool, pragmatic magic. She fingered the wand quickly before pulling her hand out of her purse and entered her therapist's office.

Dr. Renford looked at Leah. The middle aged man with a sharply trimmed goatee smiled as his regular patient sat down. He was very proud of her as this appointment was not a regular appointment. Instead, Leah had called on Monday evening and asked for an urgent but not an emergency appointment. She had said that she felt a flashback closing in on her and needed to be ready for it. A year ago, she would have just shown up at either the office that evening and waited until someone showed up in the morning, or she would have gone on a three day bender. Now, she had called and she waited. Yes, she sent a long e-mail on Wednesday night but when he called her the first thing on Thursday morning, she told him about the calming and centering exercises she had done that morning.

"Good afternoon Leah, take a seat, and do you want a glass of water or a cup of tea? I'm planning to have a cuppa"

"Yes, please, one sugar, no milk"

She made herself comfortable. The small talk was helpful as it reminded her of the normalness. She was seeing a therapist just like her Muggle parents would see an accountant or their solicitor. Her father had passed from a brain tumor during her second year at Hogwarts. Her mother had gone underground during the war to avoid Death Eaters who were rotting in Azkaban for attacking other Muggles like her. She had emerged from hiding in America estranged from her eldest daughter and overly protective of her nine year old son. Leah had tried and failed to connect with her scared mother. She could not yet accept that the war would never come back even if it seemed like there was peace and a place for her and her daughter in this world.

"So can you tell me why you wanted this appointment, Leah." His voice was quiet, calm and like a grandfather asking a granddaughter whether she wanted biscuits or cake for dessert with the hint that this was an "and" question instead of an "or" question. He leaned back and waited. The silence was comfortable for them both as she finished her sip of tea.

"I ran into Ginny Weasley on Monday at lunch. And all of a sudden I was back in school and everything was happening again. I was shaking by the time I was back on set. Thankfully, the afternoon shoot was not my scene. I could just watch and I had enough time to get a run in. That cleared my head but I couldn't eat anything on Monday night, not even double fudge chocolate cake. I called you just because I felt like if I did not call, I was going to be going back to a place I don't want to be in."

"Why did you only ask for an urgent appointment? We would have found a way to get you in on Tuesday." He smiled and again he waited.

"I know. I know you have gotten me in on Tuesday before and that helped me then. But I thought that I could handle everything as long as I knew I had an anchor at the end of the week. I could focus on coming here, having a cup of tea and talking when my heart started to race faster than a Formula 1 car, I focused on the plan and deep breaths and all of a sudden, I was back in the moment. I needed to know that I could do this… and I did." She smiled in pride at herself. She would have laughed at herself four years ago for being proud of not blindly heading to a mind healer in a rush, but that young girl was a different person than the young woman she had become.

"How do you feel right now? What do you want to do about running into Ginny Weasley?" His job was not to tell Leah how to act, but to give her the tools and the ability to choose her action. He waited as he saw the young woman bite her lip. Usually she tried to act mature beyond her years in front of any audience, but now she was still the same child stumped on a quick question from her favorite teacher because she did not realize that the suggested reading really was not suggested for any but either the most advanced or the most indifferent of students.

"I don't know. She looked good, damn, she looked stunning and her eyes were warm and welcoming. But I don't know, I barely knew her in school. She tried to protect me and she helped me after I was assaulted the first time and her and Neville and Luna got me out of the gang rape and to the hospital, but I did not know her. She was just someone bigger than life, her brothers had dominated the school for over a decade, she was dating Harry who was the school hero that every girl in my year, myself included, had a crush on, and she was just so sure of herself. She was never real to me. Now if I ran into Marie or Luann or any of the other girls from my year or my dorm, they might feel real to me, but Ginny was never part of my life except at the worst moments. "

They talked for half an hour. Mainly Dr. Renford listened for a while and asked a question here and there. Leah was mostly talking, occasionally disjointed as memories came back but a deep breath and a recentering were short breaks in the conversation. At the end of the session, the young witch smiled at her Muggle therapist as she getting up.

"Thanks doc, I'll see you next week. I think I'll take Ginny up for a cup of tea or if we're really adventurous, coffee!"

"See you next week, you're doing good for yourself Leah. We're always here if you need anything." Dr. Renford escorted his patient to the door and waited for her to leave the office. After every session with Leah, his mind always felt a little mushy as if he had heard everything, thought hard about everything but a few elements were now being jumbled and locked away. He took a deep breath before writing up his notes on the visit.


	10. Chapter 10

**May 19, 2003**

 **The Hollow**

"Ginny, get in here…."

Molly's voice carried across the crowded yard. Her daughter briefly thought about selective deafness as her boyfriend was about to make a series of bad choices. But she could hear the urgency in her mother's voice. She picked her way between bodies and over legs.

As she left the yard, Harry could barely contain himself. He had spared a moment to look at her arse and he truly appreciated the squat work-outs that she had embarked on. But he had far more important things to do than check out his lover's beautiful behind. He had a broom.

And even more importantly, he had his godson hopping up and down on the ground. Teddy's hair was bright red today. He usually had it black when he was with his Harry, but that common rule was always thrown out whenever he was with Aunty Ginny and her family. Now he was a red head just like all of them. His little giggles filled the yard. He had the undivided attention of his Harry and his Ron and his Minie.

Harry bent to a knee and held the broom steady. He reached out his hand. Tiny, chubby and very confident fingers reached into his palm. Teddy tried to jump onto the broom as he had seen all the big people do so many times. He fell flat on his face. Harry went to both knees, picked him up and threw him in the air. As Teddy reached his apogee, giggles broke out. Soon he accepted Harry's help in placing his brand new broom between his legs.

Teddy was flying now. His toes were eight inches off the ground and he was moving at the pace of Aunt Muriel at a discount breakfast buffet, but he was flying. His inchoate words of joy made everyone stop and look at him - his natural state of attention - even as Harry guided him forward and Hermione kept a finger on the straws at the end, ready to catch him just in case. They sedately walked, and then Teddy leaned down and tried to be just like Harry. He took off. He was now three feet off the ground and moving at a sprint, the wind pushing back his now black hair and squishing his face. Giggles turned into a screech as the broom went over the small duck pond. He let go and dropped into eighteen inches of water. Even before his shirt was wet, three adults were picking him up. Little arms locked tightly around Harry's neck

"Again Harry, Again?"

"Again!"

Molly was peeling potatoes underneath the kitchen window. Her daughter was now mashing them. The older woman smiled at the younger woman. Her eyes were brilliant as her hair:

"Ginny - you've got yourself a good man, he'll be a good father to your children… just practice your cushioning charms… Took us so long to get them right; probably why Charlie was never quite right; a few too many concussions…."

She stopped. Her hands plucked another potato.

"Mom, I know, but don't talk about that yet. No grand kids from us for a while, we're still just enjoying ourselves. Anyways you have the twins and Victoire and Teddy to spoil rotten now… I am enjoying watching you play with the kids and be a grandma now mom…. Things have changed, and you can enjoy yourself instead of making sure that every Knut stretched as far as possible… someday, me and Harry will bring kids home for you, but just enjoy George and Angelina's contributions to your clutch of grand kids. Or harass Percy as he said he is bringing someone over this afternoon…"

Her mother smiled. Her daughter was right. Harry would be the father of her daughter's children. And they would come when the two of them were ready for parenthood. She started to dump the potatoes into the boiling water sitting in a large, copper pot sitting on the stove. It was a gift from Ron and Hermione for her and Arthur's thirty second anniversary. The battered iron pot was no longer used every day.

"So Percy has a fancy? Just like him?"

"Not at all. She's a muggle and if there is a stick in her ass it is there only for foreplay." Molly gasped at the image as Ginny continued. "But she makes him the best Percy possible if that makes sense. Still Percy but less of a prat, you know what I mean…."

Molly smiled. "Yeah, Percy has always been Percy. He had to be different in order to get any attention from us; he was fussy even in his crib, needing to be swaddled just right to fall asleep. Probably kept George and Fred from being born for at least a year, no chance to even try…"

"MOM!"

The two women giggled. Each were seeing each other as women instead of mother and daughter. Usually this took a glass or two of fire whiskey to happen but they smiled at each other and allowed mutually unspoken and unspeakable thoughts to squeak through the other one's minds.

"Mom, just give her a chance… Me and Harry like her. We've gone out for lunch and dancing with her a couple of times. She actually can make Percy dance. Not well, that is asking too much, but he actually tries to dance something that is not old fashioned when you and dad were caught by Mr. Filch. And Mom, keep the babies in Dad's arms.

"Why, you think Percy will be embarrassed by dad?"

Ginny laughed. Molly joined her. It would be a money spinner to take action on when Percy's face would match his hair once Arthur met a new Muggle.

"No more than normal. But mom, we're just a bit much…. And Dad is a lot…"

"And you're the one always telling me to have more faith in the Muggles.." Molly was just about ready to get going when she saw her daughter shake her head.

"We're a bit much… and it is not because Meredith is a Muggle…we're just a bit much. Eight Weasleys, Harry and Hermione and Angelina, and Fleur plus half a dozen children, a few neighbors, and at least one or two people who someone invited over but no one is quite sure who. At least Luna is not here this afternoon. That is what Meredith will be seeing; her boyfriend's big, rambunctious family who all happen to be witches and wizards. Percy's broken the secret to her already so she knows she will be seeing magic and everything is just going to be weird.

But think about when Charlie brought over Stefanie from the year behind him… she was not just seeing her boyfriend's family, she was seeing the GOLDEN TRIO, THE RESISTORS OF HOGWARTS as Neville and Luna were here that afternoon, the VANQUISHER OF LESTRANGE and VEELA TRIWIZARD CHAMPION. Everyone fighting for a second helping of dessert had capital letters in Stefanie's eyes. We're a bit much…"

A bell rang.

"Dear, get the rolls from the oven, I'll make sure Arthur has at least one baby in his hands at all times…."

Two hundred feet away, Harry handed Teddy back to his grandmother. He was covered in mud and his pants were soaking wet. He was shirtless after the second fall into the pond. Teddy looked exactly like his uncle except he had no pants on, an advantage of being a child. Andromeda smiled at the young man who relished his role as a godfather. Harry made sure to steal Teddy weekly. Usually he and Ginny would find a way to take Teddy to Grimmauld Place for a completely boring but intensely loving Tuesday or Wednesday night each week. Teddy had his own room there although he refused to nap in it on his frequent weekend afternoons as there was too much fun to be had with his Harry and his Ginny. Harry at least had the energy to outlast the three year old. The older woman needed the breaks.

Ron's hand engulfed Hermione's. He, too, had lost his shirt in the quest to keep Teddy out of the pond. Harry flanked her, and both men placed their arms around her shoulders. She did not mind two well built shirtless Aurors engulfing her.

"Can we go talk by the tree, I need your brains Hermione and your strategy Ron"

"Anything dangerous? I only consult if we can lose our lives or, even worse, get expelled."

The friends laughed as they walked.

"Nothing too dangerous, just have to get a good answer back to Proudfoot soon, and I'm not sure what the question is." Harry had been trying to figure out how to be invisible in the Muggle world and he had nothing. The trio sat under the shady tree. Hermione leaned into Ron, and he leaned against the trunk. His arm wrapped around her waist and his free fingers played with her hair.

"How do we become invisible to Muggles? " Harry led with the easy question that he knew would produce the wrong answer.

Ron was the first to speak.

"Why not just use your cloak? You still have that Hallow" Ron had borrowed the cloak to prank George just two months ago. It was lying in the chest at the foot of Harry and Ginny's bed at Grimmauld Place.

"Standard spells, disillusionment charms, forget me nots, apparating where there are no cameras…" Hermione had taken her time. Her forehead had crinkled like an old sheet of parchment and her voice could barely be heard as she thought.

"That's the wrong question, you're asking us the wrong question…."

"Yes, I am. We can hide temporarily from Muggles. And if we can't then the Obliviators cover for us. But how do we hide that we're hiding something?"

"What you mean?

"When I'm under my cloak, I'm still there, I can be found by watching people bump into an invisible obstacle, or dust can settle on me, or they can listen for my breathing. I'm hidden but i still can be found. How do we hide completely?"

"Are we breaking into Gringotts, again? They've updated security; hell they're basically paying the rent on our apartment, Harry, with the retainer fee." Ron had discovered that he had a talent for breaking the security of a building. It was a combination of his experience on the run, Auror training and asking how Fred and George would have pranked the building owner. Hermione was a co-owner of their specialized consultancy as she provided the charms and warding knowledge to fill in the gaps that Ron had identified.

"No, different question from Robard and Proudfoot. How do we keep the Muggles from noticing that they normally don't notice us?"

Hermione closed her eyes. This was a good question.

"We're too good at tactical hiding and that gives us away strategically. I don't know how to fix that today, and I don't think we can as I see Percy and Meredith have just arrived…"

 **In the village of Ottery St. Catchpole**

"Thank you ma'am for your time…"

"You're welcome in. Would you like a cuppa, I'm making one for myself." The older woman smiled at the two young adults in dark blue suits standing in front of her door. The taller one was wearing a tight pencil skirt that complemented her legs while the shorter man was ill ease in the off the rack clothing. Everything seemed awkward as he moved.

"We're good, we just have a few questions, and no one is in trouble."

"Very well, please take a seat while get the kettle going."

The two civilians from MI-6 sat down on a plastic covered love seat. A grey Persian cat soon made herself at home on the lap of the junior investigator. One room over, the kettle began to sing with steam.

"Are you sure dears, it would be no bother to make some tea for you both."

"Thank you Mrs. Henley but we're good"

The old woman lumbered into the room. She had her tea cup in her left hand and placed the ceramic mug down on a cat and mouse coaster. Visitors were always pleasant, even when they were merely official and governmental visitors.

"What can we talk about?"

"Could you tell us about the Weasleys?"

"Are they in trouble, they're such a nice family..."

"No, not at all, we're investigating something that might touch on them but they're not in trouble."

She closed her eyes for a moment. The red headed family was always on the periphery of her world. The village was small, and everyone knew almost everyone. She was the old woman living down the lane who paid attention to the coming and goings. She knew the barrister was having an affair with the town's doctor. She knew that the young Pennington boy was a little light in the loafers. She knew that the Arringtons were having marriage trouble. She mainly just watched and fed her cats.

The Weasleys however, she never knew too much about. They were boisterous, but nice. They were numerous but never present. They had some land half a mile outside of the village and rarely did they ever leave it.

"There are a lot of them. I think there are some grandchildren now. Molly has shown me pictures with the biggest smile possible whenever she talks about them all. They keep to themselves, when the boys were younger, they were in town more, but since the youngest, Jenny, turned eleven, I almost never seem any of them during the school year. Some type of boarding school somewhere they all went. Outdoorsie and back to the earth, back to nature types. Not sure what they all do for a living, but from what I've seen, now that the house is empty, they are doing better for themselves. Molly and Arthur will come down to the village for a pint and a pie every now and then. Still can't keep their hands off each other."

The junior investigator was taking notes. The slightly more senior agent shifted slightly and pressed down on her skirt.

"Anyone ever around their property?"

"Some young adults, nice folks, a man and a woman. They have to be friends. Both are dating the youngest. I think they all live in London and come out to visit every month or two. A few years ago, there was a nasty fire, and the place seemed deserted, or at least I did not see anyone for a while, but that was that…"

An hour later, the two investigators thanked the older woman for her hospitality and her stories. The notebooks were getting filled. A few moments later, the old woman moved a chipped ceramic yellow bird from an end table to front window sill. Molly would see the signal and come in for a cup of tea the next time she was out for a walk.

 **The Burrow**

Midnight was a while ago. Meredith looked at her slightly drunk boyfriend point out the security challenges of hiding the fireworks from Muggle eyes. She just smiled as she knew that her eyes were the primary eyes for the display that was about to happen. He had been uptight for the first hour until he realized that he and Meredith were second fiddle. There were babies. And they were adorable. Two adults could never compete against that. After Georgina threw up on Percy's shoulder after he bounced her too hard, he relaxed. And his family was a lot, but really nice. The entire magical power thing was something that she was still processing. She only was just realizing how vulnerable Percy had made himself when he told her this truth. She had seen his wand work in her apartment a week before after she vowed secrecy, but that was almost childish compared to the omnipresence of magic at his parents' house.

Another sip of fire whiskey warmed her throat as the first firework went off. A green and gold dragon now chased a red and orange fire bird across the sky. She could get used to this.


	11. Chapter 12

**Chapter 12**

 **Muggle London May 20**

She was being crushed. Pressure was on her windpipe. Air was being cut-off. She relaxed as her eyes broke through the morning crust. In front of her were the eyes of a sociopath staring deeply into her. Her soul was being penetrated as the monster pushed down on her neck and shoulders.

"MEOW… MEOOOOOOWWWWWWWW"

She looked at the alarm clock as Warlock kneaded his way into his servant's face and neck. It was 7:30 on Sunday morning. A perfectly reasonable time to sleep through but her duties as a servant of the feline took precedence over her comfort.

"Okay, fatso, I'll get the T-U-N-A" She lifted the cat off her neck. He looked at her with betrayal and then calmed as soon as she pulled the covers off of her body. He jumped down and tried to test her agility, darting between her feet, arching his back and wrapping his tail around an ankle. Good, she was still alert, and within seconds the magic popping sound of a plastic lid popping off a tuna can opened. She scraped out an overflowing spoonful of red meat, and he proceeded to claim his due.

Even as her master ate, Leah put on the tea kettle as all things, including too early a morning were better with a good cup. She checked her e-mail on her laptop. The girls had a good time in Munich last night and wished she was there with them. Another time she thought. More importantly, the director of next week's work sent her the scene list. It was not bad; three scenes, one of which would be physically demanding.

She ate some toast and marmalade before putting on black stretch pants, a neon yellow sports bra and a comfortable gray t-shirt from the most recent ten kilometer race she competed in. Once she slid her shoes into her almost worn out running shoes, she lightly moved her wand in a circle and wav to cast a Notice-Me-Not charm. It was a luxury for any woman to run in London without being cat-called or harassed much less for someone of her profession to not be recognized. She slid her wand and her wallet into a drawstring bag. A few quid and more coins jingled and jangled at the bottom of the bag as she placed it on her back. She snuggled Warlock for a minute and went out the door before he could guilt her into an hour long snuggle session on the futon.

Shoes were laced tight in the lobby before she entered the quiet of London for a five mile run along the Thames, and then a ninety minute session of hot yoga. This was both a personal cleansing and professional preparation. Strength and flexibility stabilized her. As she ran, she decided to call Ginny tonight for a cup of coffee.

 **May 21, 2003**

He looked at his e-mail. Most were routine messages. His assistant had flagged the important ones for immediate review and replied to the housekeeping requests on her own initiative. She would make sure that he showed up when and where he was required.

He was being called back to the colors for a temporary mission. A Squadron would be on standby for hostage rescue and special missions during a medium sized international conference that was being assembled rather quickly. The Queen and her Prime Minister would be speaking to dozens of international leaders so security would be needed. Rumors had been flowing that the Regiment would be tasked but few rumors had a reserve component being activated.

"Jane, clear my calendar starting on Friday night for at least ten days"

"Yes sir" the soprano voice answered from her desk.

 **May 21, 2003**

 **Ministry of Magic**

Kingsley Shacklebolt shook hands with the newest qualified Auror. Fourteen trainees were no longer trainees. Twenty recruits had been part of the class. One resigned on the fourth day of training, three more voluntarily withdrew over three years, one knew she was close to being bounced and the other two were just not willing to make the needed commitment. Two trainees had been involuntarily separated from the office as they were a danger to others and themselves even with training.

This was the largest class of Auroris to graduate in over a century. Most years trained no more than a handful. Some years, especially during the interbellum, had no new fully qualified Aurors. This class would bring the Auror's office to the level of significantly undermanned instead of dangerously so; Aurors had fought and died at the Battle of Hogwarts, they had been ambushed in Diagon Alley, they had executed by Death Eaters during the first few weeks of the coup, and even more had gone underground and decided that the work was no longer for them. Another supersized class was a year out. Assuming normal attrition, the Auror's Office would be back to authorized pre-war strength once the smaller non-emergency cohort which had just completed their first year of training graduated.

But now he had fourteen more fully qualified Aurors. Harry Potter was the tactical leader and the best duelist while Susan Bones had taken the prize for her classroom activity. He would need them shortly. London would be hosting the Western European Convention on Magic for the first time in a decade next week. Diagon Alley was too small and crowded to accommodate all of the delegations. Muggle hotels had been booked for some of the more integrated groups that would not stick out like a unicorn's horn. He would need the extra Aurors for security.

That was a problem for tomorrow. Him and Gawain could take a few hours off this afternoon as the new Aurors celebrated. One advantage of being in a large class is that buying drinks for all of the trainers would not cost any Auror their first month's salary like it had cost him on his graduation day.

 **May 23, 2003**

 **Muggle London**

The young woman hurried out of the Tube station. Her eyes darted back and forth as she took in the rush of the City as it was slowing down from its work day. Thousands of Muggles were leaving their offices where they performed symbolic manipulation magic that transformed spreadsheets into paychecks. It was beyond her ken. Another wave of Muggles were coming into the center of London for an evening of enjoyment and entertainment. That was a world she could understand.

Ginny breathed deeply as she turned down a narrow alley. Pakistani spices mixed with Lebanese chickpeas and Jamaican jerk stands. Her nose was leading to her mind being bewitched, her senses ensnared and the fame plated. Half a dozen stalls and small doors leading into basement restaurants, she stepped into a North Indian restaurant that had some of the best chai she knew.

Her eyes scanned back and forth as she adjusted to the light. Half a dozen families were eating their dinner. A seven year old was being obstinate as he wanted pizza and not the food that his parents had grown up with. A pair of university students were taking a break from a summer project while a trio of management consultant trainees spared no time to talk; calories, suitably flavored, were the priority. Her head turned again, and then she noticed what she needed to see.

Leah was sitting by herself. Her dyed hair was gone. She was back to being a natural brunette wearing beetle glasses as she devoured a well worn novel in her hand. The table was off the wall and no one chair could see all exits.

Leah put her book down, rose and wrapped Ginny up in a hug:

"So good to see you, I'm glad you picked up the phone." She smiled and released the red head from her grasp.

"I'm happy to see you, anyway we can get a different table?" Ginny's palms were sweaty and the hair on her wrists was up.

Leah's eyes rose slightly. "We're safe here, this is one of my regular spots. We're in Muggle London in a hole in the wall." She pulled out Ginny's chair and then sat back down. A waitress came over and placed a steaming cup of spiced tea and milk in front of Leah.

"May I get you anything or do you need a moment?"

"I'll take what she has" Ginny mumbled. Her fingers rolled around her wand in her purse. Her eyes could not focus on only the waitress and her old classmate. They wandered through the restaurant. She saw nothing beyond a pleasant evening and sat down in her chair with her fingers knowing exactly where her wand was.

"I was surprised to see you… I just never really pictured you to be someone spending a lot of time in Muggle London."

"Same here, I didn't expect to see you. I knew you went underground and disappeared as soon as you left the school, but I had not heard a thing from you". Ginny parried the conversation's opening gambit easily. Little was given and little was offered.

"I had nothing on the other side. I was worthless and vulnerable and unable to trust anyone. Anyone who would want to help me either knew nothing or could not risk themselves. Over here, I was able to walk into a hospital and get treated. And then I could survive. No one cared about me. At least no one cared about my past and my family and my blood. I was alone, but I was free for the first time and I did not have to fight to breathe."

"You doing well?"

"I think so. 5th Year fucked me up. I was a wreck for the next two years. Still have my days, but I am not haunted by the Carrows or the Inquisitiorial Squad any more… how about you?" Leah sipped her tea as the waitress gave Ginny her hot drink. Ginny held the mug tightly underneath her nose and for the first time since she got on the Tube, she relaxed. The cardamom and cinnamon went through her nose. The ginger brought her back to the hearth at the Burrow when she was eight years old. Dad's bonus was short that year and there were five boys at Hogwarts. Mom stretched and skimped and somehow despite the only presents being hand me down toys and a single hand knitted sweater, the spice cakes were the best she had ever eaten. She had helped her mother with those cakes and she wanted the smell to remain embedded in her clothes for the entire winter as her family was happy.

"Most days, I'm well. I lift, I fly, I practice Quidditch, and then come home and see Harry and then we'll go about it again tomorrow. Most days are good. I still have dreams. I still dream of being possessed by Riddle. I still see you and too many others being tortured by the Carrows. I remember my screams. And then, I wake up, and I go lift and fly some more." Leah looked at her hero with new eyes. The war was still wounding Ginny. Leah had walked away and found that her strength had to be with openness, openness to get help, openness to others and openness with herself.

She reached across the table and her hands wrapped themselve's around Ginny's strong Chaser hands that could grab a screaming Quaffle out of thin ear with only the tips of two fingers. Black painted nails covered coral nails and Leah's thumb squeezed Ginny's palm.

"I found help. I lived with the war, but it is not living in me anymore." Leah closed her eyes for a moment as she remembered her thrice weekly sessions initially. Her GP recognized the signs of trauma and rape in front of her; her patient refused to call it that and Leah would not say where she had been hurt, but the GP knew that she could not take care of the teenager on her own. Leah went and some days, she talked, other days she sat in a chair with her knees tucked under her chin and her back facing her therapist in silence for an entire hour. She controlled that hour and he never forced the conversation even as he created space for her to talk. And once she started talking, the talking did not hurt her as much as she feared. Her therapist saw her as a person worthy of respect, worthy of listening, worthy of care even as terrible things came out of her mouth. Three times a week became two, and then one. Leah knew she would always need someone to talk to, but now the past was in the past, the future would become the present while the present is now.

Ginny looked at the younger girl. She was doing so much better than she thought she would have seen. Leah was at home in Muggle London and at home with herself. She envied her.

"So what do you do? Me, I'm doing a little of everything; mainly Quidditch but taking a couple of classes at the Ministry and doing a tiny bit of writing for the Quibbler." The waitress forced a pause in the conversation as she came to ask if they wanted dinner or merely drinks. Leah ordered a vegetarian dosa plate for the two young women to share.

"I perform."

"Sing?"

"No, acting and some dancing. . I found that I like it, and I am good at it. I got lucky that is the case as I have little else I can do in this world. Even behind the Alley, I was only a mediocre student with only mediocre chances. Now I have a job I like, some great co-workers and colleagues, and it all pays well. Last year, I made the Muggle equivalent of over ten thousand Galleons after taxes."

Ginny's brain engaged quickly. She was making almost as much as a fully trained Auror. Taxes were different and the exchange rates were funny after the level of transfer was above pocket cash. But even with all of this, the young woman in front of her was doing well.

"That is amazing. Have I seen your work? I don't think I'll ever make that much behind the Alley as you put it; Harry will eventually if he becomes a Senior Auror… is it something I can do in my spare time?" Ginny was too used to being poor to give up a good chance.

"It is all on the Internet nowadays, are you wired at your house?"

"No, my dad would lose his mind if we ran Muggle wires to the house. My flat with Harry is wired, but we don't keep a computer there, too many bugs, but the extermination spells never turn up anything; I don't quite get what the technician means…"

"We're always looking, and with your body, you could find work, but it is a tough business; stick with Quidditch, it is as much fun easier on your knees."

The dosas were delivered to the table. The two girls attacked the tasty food in comfortable silence. As the last pancake was finished, and idle chit chat filled the evening while the waitress settled the check, Leah looked at Ginny hard. This was the first time Leah had ever seen Ginny relax. She made a decision and reached into her purse.

"You don't have to do anything, but I go talk to a Muggle therapist and I found it really helpful. His name and contact information is on the card if you ever want to talk to him." She handed the card over to her surprised dining companion. It laid on the table for an infinite silence. Ten seconds later, Ginny picked it up and slipped it into her purse.

"Thanks… it was good to see you Leah."

Ginny walked out of the restaurant with her fingers brushing her wand and the card's corner poking into her knuckles.


	12. Chapter 13 Prep Time

**AUTHOR'S NOTE:**

 _Thanks for sticking with this story. I've been doing an amazing amount of writing but for things that actually pay me on a regular basis so this story has been floating in the back of my head during my morning walks. I've not been able to always get the time to write for pure fun that I would like to have. This story won't be abandoned, but it may be sporadic._

 _As far as one review on Chapter 6, the sergeant got Granger's name by asking around at a very low/informal pre-investigatory level. A chapter is not missing either as I had an authorial response to a review that I then took back down._

 _ENJOY and thank you again for indulging me with your patience._

 **May 28, 2001**

 **12 Grimmauld Place**

"Love you"

Harry's feet stopped and he would have smiled if he had a chance. Ginny kissed him quickly and softly, taking in the last moment of domestic tranquility with him before he was on duty for the next four days. He broke the kiss as he needed to be at the office in seven minutes and the walk from the central atrium to the Auror's bullpen took four minutes and forty one seconds.

"Love you too"

He pinched the green powder and through it into the fireplace where green flames rose up and he stepped in as he called out his destination. A moment later, he stepped into the atrium and through the security checkpoints that used the same logic and charms as the Marauder's Map that was cross-checking names against a white list.

"Harry Potter, Auror's Office"

The hit wizard waved him through. A dozen other wizards in Auror red and hit-wizard blue robes were hurrying along the same path as he was. The early arrivals had hot coffee and muffins in hands while Harry's hands were empty. Hopefully the briefing would have food or be short. As he went through the Auror's office outer atrium and past the secretary, a sixty something witch who had been a four times Hogwarts dueling champion in her youth, the smell of institutional breakfast greeted him. This was going to be a long briefing.

 **Elsewhere in Muggle London**

"Fifteen-two, fifteen-four, fifteen-six and fifteen eight and two pairs for twelve." The pegs on the cribbage board were moved. The reservist smiled, one more good hand and he could peg out. The morning was starting out right, he would be up two pounds at five pennies a point, the going rate in the Artists Rifles. As his opponent, and battle buddy shuffled the cards, the Sergeant Major looked at them. It was the look of mild annoyance. There were intelligence reports to read, equipment to mend, scenarios to walk through and a controversial penalty decision to argue about. Only bubble heads should play cribbage.

The squadron had been on alert since Saturday. Each of the four troops took a twelve hour shift as the on-call assault force. The third troop had been alert for two hours now. The intelligence briefing at the start of the shift had been routine. A little bit of noise from a splinter faction in Ireland, a few radicals with ties to the Levant had gone silent (they had to attend their grandfather's funeral and fell off the grid as the traveled to Glasgow) and little else. The conference was ongoing and routine.

 **Heathrow Airport**

Two tall men reached down for large bags. They had just arrived from New York. Their tickets were paid for in cash and they told the ticket agent that they had an urgent sales call which is why their suitcases were full of metal prototypes. Security had been a breeze, as the X-rays saw harmless doodads and thingamabobs. Even if the bags had been opened, nothing unsightly would be seen.

They headed to the customs counter, their passports out along with declaration forms indicating a short stay on business with nothing beyond business samples and a few days worth of clothes. The taller man went to the first agent.

"Good morning, Mr. Green, may I see your passport and your declaration?"

"Yes Ma'am" He was polite at the Muggle security officer. His patience could hold for a few more hours as attracting attention here would slow down the entire scheme that had been assembled over the past six months. The form was in order, and even if it wasn't the non-verbal Confundus he had cast a moment before he stepped up would be more than sufficient to paper over any irregularities. An Imperio would be even more certain, but that type of magic flared its power and left traces that could be found after his escape plan had started. No, being discreet was the better course of action now.

The Muggle checked her computer. The passport number checked out. Half a dozen visas to Paris, Belfast, Rio de Janeiro, Barcelona and Rome covered the first few pages. The picture was actually good. It matched the man in front of her well. Tall, strong jaw line, broad shoulders, dark eyes, almost purple in their chocolate brown, and long blond hair gracefully maintained. There was nothing suspicious about this man and his slightly shorter raven haired partner.

"Enjoy your stay here Mr. Green."

"Have a good morning to Miss." And then he walked away to a news stand where he waited for Mr. White to join him.

Ten minutes later, they were in a cab, their luggage in a boot, twelve factory fresh AR-15s with sixty magazines just waiting for their transfiguration to be reversed. The driver knew nothing except to get the two Americans to their hotel in the City.

 **Gatwick**

Half a dozen men landed on the morning Ryan Air flight. They had no luggage besides a single carry-on bag per man containing three days worth of clothes, a wash kit and two weeks worth of wages in cash, small bills, unmarked and non-sequential.

Another flight carrying a similar team would arrive in the afternoon. All the men headed to a safe house in the city near the docks.

 **London**

"Harry, gonna finish your sandwich?"

"Nah, tasted a little funny, all yours if you want it"

"Thanks mate" Ron grabbed the quarter sandwich and jammed it into his mouth. They had been sitting on a bench for the past half hour, talking non-specific semi-local sport chatter and eyeing a few of the nannies and secretaries who walked by. It was part of their cover. Mainly they were keeping an eye on the rear entrance to the largest magical accessible convention space in London. It was a Muggle building, an Edwardian hotel that had been built by a family.

Harry wiped crumbs from his lips and his eyes scanned the street. Him and Ron had the first shift of covert surveillance on the main entrance way to the conference. Ministry functionaries were in the hotel lobby greeting individuals who had apparated or port keyed into Greater London over the past day. Half of the conference had already been registered and were meeting with friends, colleagues and associates over a working pre-plenary lunch. His green eyes were scanning, casually never focusing too hard on any one face, but staying long enough to inspect that face for tension and unexpected stress. One woman's mouth was flared with lips pursed out and up, but this disgust was readily explained by the screaming toddler in her arms who had just thrown up on her. Teddy had done that to Harry and Ginny more than once while Victoire had sprayed Ron in a sneak attack that still made his sister in law chuckle every time she handed her daughter off to her youngest new brother.

Ron's elbow dug into Harry's ribs.

"Mate, two blocks away, far side, in front of the bakery. Take a look" Ron was pitching his voice low and discreet. Three years ago, he would have risen and pursued, but now he could wait. He would wait.

Harry looked down the street.

Old man with a Yorkshire terrier.

Two students sharing a bubble tea and notes.

A young brunette pushing a pram and singing a quiet song.

That pram was a new model with spring suspensions. There was no weight on the springs. Odd.

"Call this in, have Bones do a walk by"

A moment later, there was a crack in the air that could have been a broken window or a hard cow shot on a cricket pitch. From between a theatre and a closed pub, Susan Bones emerged, dressed in a tight skirt, long hose, tall boots and a tight top. Her waist long pink hair screamed for attention as she stepped onto the sidewalk and in between two blokes in tailored suits. Their heads followed her as she walked past them. She bumped into the pram and began to apologize for clumsiness. Her hands closed briefly on the young woman pushing the pram and Ron saw a brief laugh as Susan turned again, flipping some hair over her left shoulder and waved.

All clear. No threat.

Susan walked down the street. She cast a non-verbal and wandless Notice Me Not a moment after the sergeant major of the Artists Rifles walked out of the troop's staging area. His eyes tracked the vivacious young woman, his wife would only smile if she saw him, and then his eyes hurt and she became forgettable within a few steps. Two observation posts for the convening space needed to be checked and it was the job of the sergeant to make sure that none of his men got bored.

As he walked past the hotel, he shook his head. He swore he had just seen Potter and the gangly red head a block in front of him. Those two men turned down a short alley with no easy exit. Eighty one steps later, he turned his head slightly to the right and could not find the two familiar near strangers in the alley.

Odd.

He pulled up his phone and soon a three man team would do a thoroughly casual look of the alley even as he moved to the first observation post. A minute later, he was whispering words with the surveillance team watching the back entry into the conference center. They had seen nothing unusual nor had they seen a pink haired young woman at any point.

A mile up the Thames from the sergeant making his rounds, Ginny Weasley was trying to rewire her essay. Her pen was being chewed every third sentence, and soon it was nub. Hermione merely glanced at her as she was revising an essay for one of her independent studies. It was due in September but she wanted to be able to hand the project off to her professor for submission before she headed to the Riviera for a week at the end of July with her parents.

"You know, the boys, they'll be on break in an hour and a half, we should head over to see them then" Ginny had put down her pen and audaciously dared to break her friend's concentration during a revision. The bushy haired witch's fingers slammed into the keyboard of her new laptop a few more times. She looked up, smiled and nodded.

"Give me an hour, we'll see them for some tea and then we can keep on re-writing at your place."

She looked down again at the keyboard and resumed her assault on the research material. There was a thread that needed to be pulled to unravel a seemingly sound argument built on a single unshaky assumption and Ginny would not keep her from that. Ginny knew enough to not taunt a dragon guarding gold nor to disturb Hermione during a study session, so she smiled at herself and allowed her mind to wander as the paragraphs still were not coming together.

 **Elsewhere in London**

Fourteen men were smiling. Blueprints were on the walls of an abandoned warehouse. Four men were walking forty yards from the main cluster in a diamond shape. The lead man stopped and shouted: "From here, we hold the exit point, no one in, no one out till you all get back"

Mr. Green nodded. The help was able to listen and think for themselves. He would take the first group of the main body while Mr. White would lead the second group. That was a diversion, a loud and prominent diversion, but a diversion none the less. The help did not know exactly what Mr. Green was doing, he had just promised and delivered funds, guns, bombs, and a mission while they had provided safe houses, intelligence and planning skills that they had not been able to use since the Good Friday Accords.


	13. Chapter 13 A Slow waltz

**CHAPTER 13**

 **May 28, 2001**

 **1930**

Harry left the staging area. He had caught a short kip and a good bite to eat. Ron had several good bites. They had changed clothes, looking like students taking the first week of classes during a summer term seriously. Each had a notebook and a text book regarding the intricacies of late Victorian and early Edwardian diplomacy among the great powers. It was enough of a cue to keep almost anyone from engaging in a long conversation with them as they found their way to a waist high wall eighty yards from the hotel hosting the convention. So far, nothing unusual had been seen but the unofficial Auror creed of CONSTANT VIGILANCE had to be maintained as the dignitaries swayed to the music of a band that had been floo-ed in from Helsinki.

Hermione closed her laptop. She was done with this draft. There would be at least another five drafts of the methods section and the limitations of her analysis were notable but she could worry about those problems another day. She would find Ginny and they would find wine.

Ginny had found refuge in the dueling lounge of Grimmauld Place. Half a dozen dummies had been blown up. Sweat weighed down her ponytail as she finished casting the last chain of offensive spells. She cast a quick diagnostic spell, her heart rate was recovering nicely; down to two beats per second from a peak of almost seven beats every two seconds.

Harry had been distant to her during their afternoon tea. She had little reason to expect anything else from him today. He was on call even if he was on a break but his mind was barely hovering over his cup of tea as he kept the constant flow of people and the patterns that they fell into circling through his memory. This was their life and usually she had no reason to complain, but seeing Harry as Auror Harry instead of Lover Harry or Seeker Harry or God-dad Harry was still uncomfortable.

Hermione had grown up with Harry and his overwhelming sense of responsibility and "Saving People" thing narrowing his world down to the immediate threat inventory, so she passed his distraction off to his natural behavior; Ginny had seldom fought shoulder to shoulder and hip to hip with Harry. She had to deal with this, or she could not spend her life with him. She would deal.

John Houlihan, regimental sergeant major and tonight, the senior non-commissioned officer bunking down with the alert troop went through the reports and the evening schedule. B Troop was maintaining overwatch on the conference. Tonight the dignitaries were being entertained while the real work would be done at the staff level over good wine and better gin while a band played along in the background. D Troop was on alert. They had come into the ready room an hour and a half ago and would wait, hoping for inaction, but ready for sudden chaos. A Troop was asleep and C Troop was preparing to rest as well.

Leah tucked her hair back before picking up her bag. The shoot was long, her jaw was sore, her back was stiff. The camera man had fucked up the first scene so she had to take everything over again. But the director at least was kind, he had rearranged the shooting schedule, allowing the actors from the mis-shot scene to rest and reblock the action for three hours before performing again. A similar fuck-up had occurred in one of her first jobs; she had thirty five seconds to recover and reset. She never worked with that director again. Now that she was back into civilian clothes, she was ready to go for a walk, collect a breath and a good night sleep before coming back to work tomorrow. Her fingers barely caressed her wand as she left the sound stage.

Kingsley smiled. The conference was going well. The Bulgarian delegation was getting along marvelously with the Dutch, and somehow the Greengrasses had already lined up a trio of potential contracts with Spanish and Italian suppliers. The speeches of the distinguished guests had been short, pithy and informative. The food was plentiful and tasty. The participants had a pleasant energy of a conference that would produce long lasting collaborations and innovative work while still allowing for most of the people to leave with smiles and a laugh at the good times that were had in the social sessions.

His assistant looked him over. His hands smoothed his collar, and then the Minister of Magic came out from behind the curtain behind the dais. A dozen witches could conceivably have the slight honor of having his first dance. He glanced at a young debutante from Issel, she was not connected well enough. A beauty from Andorra had the lineage but not the power, so his eyes sought out a Swiss witch just a few years younger than him, but still in the height of her beauty. Yes, she was the one he should ask for a dance, an enjoyable spin with a witch holding a mastery in charms and a doctorate in transfiguration. Madame Lavoille would be a safe choice as her husband would smile at his wife's enjoyment while Kingsley could have a pleasant four minute conversation with someone far smarter than him.

As he approached her, the band changed tunes to something slower and muggle. A waltz, his feet could follow that.

Even as the violins whined in tune and to the beat, three vans turned a corner two miles away. The blue van had a single driver. It was heavily weighed down with seven hundred kilograms of ANFO. The driver was nervous as the checkpoints that had been put up after Bishopgate would have kept him from achieving his mission. The checkpoints had been taken down after the traitors had ended the Struggles. He called in a number on his mobile and muttered a few authentication phrases and gave a ten minute warning that a major bombing would occur.

The green and white vans had five and eight men in them respectively. They were parked in pre-paid spaces and the men waited. A few smoked, a trio drank fresh Cokes and the rest waited for the signal.

Everyone waited.


End file.
